AMD R9 290X in 2019: Benchmark vs. RX 590, GTX, RTX, & More | GamersNexus
The AMD R9 290X, a 2013 release, was the once-flagship of the 200 series, later superseded by the 390X refresh, (sort of) the Fury X, and eventually the RX-series cards. The R9 290X typically ran with 4GB of memory, although the 390X made 8GB somewhat commonplace, and was a strong performer for early 1440p gaming and high-quality 1080p gaming. The goal posts have moved, of course, as time has mandated that games get more difficult to render, but the 290X is still a strong enough card to warrant a revisit in 2019.
The R9 290X still has some impressive traits today, and those influence results to a point of being clearly visible at certain resolutions. One of the most noteworthy features is its 64 count of ROPs, where the output is converted into a bitmapped image, and its 176 TMUs. The ROPs assist in improving performance scaling as resolution increases, something that also correlates with higher anti-aliasing values (same idea – sampling more times per pixel or drawing more pixels). For this reason, we’ll want to pay careful attention to performance scaling at 1080p, 1440p, and 4K versus some other device, like the RX 580. The RX 580 is a powerful card for its price-point, often managing comparable performance to the 290X while running half the ROPs and 144 TMUs, but the 290X can close the gap (mildly) at higher resolutions. This isn’t particularly useful to know, but is interesting, and illustrates how specific parts of the GPU can change the performance stack under different rendering conditions.
Today, we’re testing with a reference R9 290X that’s been run through both stock and overclocked, giving us a look at the bottom-end performance and average partner model or OC performance. This should cover most the spectrum of R9 290X cards.
Test Methodology
Testing methodology has completely changed from our last GPU reviews, which were probably for the GTX 1070 Ti series cards.
Most notably, we have overhauled the host test bench and had updated with new games. Our games selection is a careful one: Time is finite, and having analyzed our previous testing methodologies, we identified shortcomings where we were ultimately wasting time by testing too many games that didn’t provide meaningfully different data from our other tested titles. In order to better optimize our time available and test “smarter” (rather than “more,” which was one of our previous goals), we have selected games based upon the following criteria:
- Game Engine: Most games run on the same group of popular engines. By choosing one game from each major engine (e.g. Unreal Engine), we can ensure that we are representing a wide sweep of games that just use the built-in engine-level optimizations
- API: We have chosen a select group of DirectX 11 and DirectX 12 API integrations, as these are the most prevalent at this time. We will include more Vulkan API testing as more games ship with Vulkan
- Popularity: Is it something people actually play?
- Longevity: Regardless of popularity, how long can we reasonably expect that a game will go without updates? Updating games can hurt comparative data from past tests, which impacts our ability to cross-compare new data and old, as old data may no longer be comparable post-patch
Game graphics settings are defined in their respective charts.
We are also testing most games at all three popular resolutions – at least, we are for the high-end. This includes 4K, 1440p, and 1080p, which allows us to determine GPU scalability across multiple monitor types. More importantly, this allows us to start pinpointing the reason for performance uplift, rather than just saying there is performance uplift. If we know that performance boosts harder at 4K than 1080p, we might be able to call this indicative of a ROPs advantage, for instance. Understanding why performance behaves the way it does is critical for future expansion of our own knowledge, and thus prepares our content for smarter analysis in the future.
For the test bench proper, we are now using the following components:
GPU Test Bench (Sponsored by Corsair)
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Component
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Courtesy of
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CPU
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Intel i7-8086K 5.0GHz
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GamersNexus
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GPU
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This is what we’re testing!
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Often the company that makes the card, but sometimes us (see article)
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Motherboard
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ASUS ROG Maximus X Hero
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ASUS
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RAM
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Corsair Vengeance LPX 32GB 3200MHz
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Corsair
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PSU
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Corsair AX1600i
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Corsair
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Cooler
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NZXT Kraken X62
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NZXT
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SSD
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Plextor 256-M7VC
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GamersNexus
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Sniper Elite 4 Benchmark – R9 290X 2019 vs.
RTX 2070, 2060, GTX 970, RX 590
Sniper Elite 4 will start us out. Before displaying results, remember that one of the most interesting areas to look is going to be scaling performance between two fixed goalposts as we change resolutions. If the distance between those goalposts shrinks, that is indicative of an architectural advantage or deficit at the new resolution. We’ll set the RX 580 and R9 290X at stock settings for these posts. Sniper Elite 4 gives us a well-optimized DirectX 12 title to test with, which is valuable because we want higher framerates even at 4K to better illustrate some of those scaling gaps. Keep in mind that the 290X came out long before 4K was popularized. 1080p still had almost all of the marketshare.
At 4K first, we see the R9 290X stock card at 38FPS AVG, with lows surprisingly close by at 32FPS and 30FPS 1% and 0.1% low. We’ll look at frametimes in a moment. Overclocking headroom was limited and capped at about 1060MHz, getting us to 41FPS AVG and climbing 7.
9% over the R9 290X stock card. These performance figures peg the R9 290X and its overclocked counterpart at rough equivalence with the RX 580 8GB card, not too distant from the new RX 590 Fatboy. This is without yet considering power consumption, mind you. The GTX 1060 is just surpassed by our R9 290X results, as is the GTX 970.
For our goal posts, the R9 290X stock GPU allows the RX 580 8GB stock GPU to hold a lead of about 2.9%.
Transitioning to the more limited 1080p results, we see now that the R9 290X has a stock framerate of about 98FPS AVG, allowing the RX 580 8GB card a lead of 9.4% with its 107FPS AVG. The fact that the R9 290X closed the gap at 4K suggests to us that the 580 becomes limited in its ROPs and TMUs, but primarily ROPs. The 290X is better equipped on this front leaving its biggest limitation as frequency, which is why the card has more trouble keeping up at the lower resolutions. Once the RX 580 gets pounded with higher demand on the pixel pipeline, where it becomes more limited, the R9 290X pulls ahead.
This same pattern would emerge with anti-aliasing, as it’s effectively increasing the sample rate in the same way as increasing resolution, thus also becoming ROPs-bound rapidly.
As for 1080p performance on the whole, the 290X performs behind a GTX 1060 6GB card and ahead of an RX 570 4GB card.
Frametimes are what we’re most curious about. As a reminder, frametime plots demonstrate the frame-to-frame variance in time to present a new frame. This is a measure of frame-to-frame intervals in milliseconds, so lower is better, versus benchmark progression. The more consistent each point on the line is to the previous, the better the experience. Deviation from the mean in excess of 8-12ms becomes noticeable to most gamers.
The R9 290X does well in this department with Sniper Elite 4. To Sniper’s credit, the game is remarkably well-built, but the 290X still needs the right hardware to keep frame pacing consistent. In this title, we don’t see too much deviation from the mean frametime, with the biggest variance in the form of 3-4ms swings.
This is completely acceptable and, as you can see, isn’t too distant from the modern RX 590’s performance. The 590 has fewer peaks on average, but the difference in consistency is unnoticeable overall for most players. The RTX 2060 is also plotted as an example of the most modern architecture, where we’re nearing an ideal frametime plot. The takeaway is that the 290X does well in frametime consistency in this particular title, and that’s despite some early life issues with frametime consistency. Many of these were patched-up with later driver launches, but the rest would likely be more game- or API-dependent.
F1 2018 – R9 290X Benchmark in 2019
F1 2018 is next, giving us a DirectX 11 game that uses the same API as most of the market back when the 290X released. Just for scaling reasons, we’ll look at 4K results, despite this card not really being meant for it in 2019.
At 4K, the R9 290X 4GB card ends up at about 33FPS AVG, ranking it as similar to the GTX 1060 6GB and GTX 970.
The RX 580 8GB outperforms the 290X 4GB by 4.6%, landing at 34FPS AVG. We can also learn from the 390X result, which shows a 34FPS AVG. This card is a refresh of the 290X, with a higher frequency and double the memory capacity. In this title, it rapidly becomes clear that memory is not the primary limitation, as performance only increases by a few percentage points. The 290X and 390X are more limited by the GPU than by the memory.
Moving on to 1440p, we see similar resolution scaling as the previous game: The RX 580 stock GPU’s 56.6FPS AVG is 9.1% ahead of the R9 290X’s 51.9FPS AVG, posting a relative gain in performance for the RX 580. Again, we think this is because the R9 290X can leverage its increased ROPs and texture units at higher resolutions or higher anti-aliasing values, closing the gap as resolution increases. That doesn’t mean it’s playable at those higher resolutions, but does illustrate how the GPUs scale.
For 1440p resolution, the 290X is still reasonably playable in this title.
Dropping settings from ultra-high to just ‘high’ or similar would make for a consistent 60FPS and beyond. Comparatively, the 290X does about as well as the GTX 970, although the 290X’s lows manage higher results, with the 390X not too distant. The 390X’s extra memory doesn’t get leveraged in a meaningful way for this benchmark. Versus some modern cards, the 290X is outperformed by the GTX 1060 and RX 580 alike.
We don’t see too much improvement for the 290X at 1080p, moving up to 65FPS AVG and with still minimal gains from overclocking. The RX 580 8GB runs at 72FPS AVG, for a lead of 11.6%. To recap this title, we see 11.6% improvement in the RX 580 at 1080p, 9.1% at 1440p, and 4.6% at 4K, showing very clear performance improvements in the higher-frequency, newer cards at lower resolutions.
Shadow of the Tomb Raider — R9 290X Benchmark vs. GTX 980, 970, RTX 2070
Shadow of the Tomb Raider is up next, giving us a DirectX 12 title for another modern look at performance.
Dx12 didn’t officially launch until 2015, so the 290X was made well before the new API saw any adoption.
At 4K, the 290X obviously struggles at 24FPS AVG, making it largely unplayable with these settings. The RX 580 doesn’t do much better at 25FPS AVG, with the 590 at 28FPS AVG. Let’s move on to something more reasonable.
At 1440p, the 290X runs at about 42FPS AVG, with the GTX 1060 functionally tied with the 290X. The differences are inside of error margins, so we can’t state if one is better than the other. The RX 580 8GB leads at 45FPS AVG, with the RX 590 at 50FPS AVG and Vega 56 at 62FPS AVG.
1080p positions the R9 290X in playable territory even with these higher settings, at 60FPS AVG for the overclocked version – about where most partner cards would fall – and 58FPS AVG for the stock model. That puts the 290X as comparable to the GTX 1060 6GB and behind the RX 580 8GB.
Far Cry 5 Benchmark – R9 290X Revisit
Far Cry 5 uses geometrically complex meshes and longer view distances, making it one of the more draw call-intensive games we benchmark.
At 4K, Far Cry 5 positions the 290X at 26FPS AVG, right between the GTX 970 and GTX 980 cards, and affording the RX 580 a lead of 8.3% at 28FPS AVG. This isn’t particularly playable under these settings so, once again, we’re mostly using them for perspective.
At 1440p, performance climbs significantly to 43FPS AVG, which is about where the RX 570 and 390X perform. NVIDIA’s GTX 1060 6GB outperforms the 290X by a few percent here, with the most modern cards posting significant leads. The RX 580 holds a 16.7% lead, showing one of the largest gaps we’ve seen between the two yet, but still following the trends we saw previously.
1080p really carries this trend, now allowing the RX 580 8GB card a lead of 22%, which is the biggest gain we’ve seen thus far. As a reminder, that’s against 8.3% at 4K and 16.7% at 1440p, so our earlier theory remains consistent. As for raw framerate, the 290X is still adequate for 60FPS in Far Cry 5 at 1080p and with these settings, but it is getting long in the tooth.
Vega 56 and GTX 1070s or even RTX 2060s would offer considerable performance improvements, as you can see in the chart.
GTA V Benchmark – R9 290X Revisit
GTA V is a 2015 game and is the oldest on our benchmark, but is also the most-played game out of everything in this test suite.
At 4K, GTA V lands the R9 290X at 24FPS AVG, which is within error of the RX 580 or slightly leading it, for the first time all bench, and not distant from the GTX 970. This is more of a synthetic look, of course, since it’s not particularly playable.
1440p again posts the R9 290X and RX 580 as roughly equal performance. We run GTA V with 2x MSAA, so it is likely that we’re seeing a potential ROPs limitation on the 580. The 390X does actually post meaningful improvement over the R9 290X here, landing at 53FPS AVG, but this is clearly more of a change in frequency than memory capacity, as the overclocked 290X is not too distant from the 390X.
Conclusion: R9 290X in 2019
It’s really not all that bad, although is considerably aged in its ability to run some of these titles at higher resolutions.
If willing to occasionally drop settings to medium or high, shying away from ultra, and if willing to stick to 1080p, the R9 290X still does reasonably well in these games. Going for better graphics settings might suggest that it’s about time to replace the GPU, though, and in such instances, you’d want to shoot higher than an RX 580, RX 590, or GTX 1060. The R9 290X maintains performance roughly equivalent to these devices – or close enough that the differences aren’t worth a purchase – in modern gaming scenarios, even including DirectX 12. Keeping in mind that Dx12 didn’t even publicly exist when the R9 290X was released, the fact that the 290X maintains overall acceptable performance in Dx12 titles is impressive.
Jumping to Vega-class cards or RTX 2070 would sort of be the entry point for this one, minimally, as anything short of that is a pointless endeavor and more of a “side-grade.” The most interesting take-away, we think, is how the R9 290X managed to close the gap between itself and the RX 580 when playing at increasing resolutions.
The natural downside is that the R9 290X isn’t particularly well-equipped for these games at 4K, anyway; while closing the gap is interesting, it doesn’t change the story that these games are functionally unplayable at such high settings and resolutions. The biggest motivator for an upgrade will likely be supporting those higher resolution displays, especially that they’re properly affordable now, unlike when the 290X launched.
The card is getting long in the tooth, but it’s still good a little while longer for anyone truly pinching pennies.
Editorial, Testing: Steve Burke
Video: Andrew Coleman
Radeon R9 290X [in 9 benchmarks]
Summary
AMD started Radeon R9 290X sales 24 October 2013 at a recommended price of $549. This is a desktop graphics card based on a GCN architecture and made with 28 nm manufacturing process. It is primarily aimed at gamer market. 4 GB of GDDR5 memory clocked at 1.25 GHz are supplied, and together with 512 Bit memory interface this creates a bandwidth of 320 GB/s.
Compatibility-wise, this is dual-slot card attached via PCIe 3.0 x16 interface. Its manufacturer default version has a length of 275 mm. 1 x 6-pin + 1 x 8-pin power connector is required, and power consumption is at 250 Watt.
It provides poor gaming and benchmark performance at
18.96%
of a leader’s which is NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090.
GeForce RTX4090
Compare
General info
Some basic facts about Radeon R9 290X: architecture, market segment, release date etc.
| Place in performance ranking | 240 | |
| Value for money | 9.99 | |
| Architecture | GCN (2011−2017) | |
| GPU code name | Hawaii XT | |
| Market segment | Desktop | |
| Design | reference | |
| Release date | 24 October 2013 (9 years old) | |
| Launch price (MSRP) | $549 | |
| Current price | $210 (0. 4x MSRP) |
of 168889 (A100 PCIe 80 GB) |
Value for money
Performance to price ratio. The higher, the better.
Technical specs
Radeon R9 290X’s specs such as number of shaders, GPU base clock, manufacturing process, texturing and calculation speed. These parameters indirectly speak of Radeon R9 290X’s performance, but for precise assessment you have to consider its benchmark and gaming test results.
| Pipelines / CUDA cores | 2816 | of 20480 (Data Center GPU Max NEXT) |
| Boost clock speed | 947 MHz | of 3599 (Radeon RX 7990 XTX) |
| Number of transistors | 6,200 million | of 14400 (GeForce GTX 1080 SLI Mobile) |
| Manufacturing process technology | 28 nm | of 4 (GeForce RTX 4080) |
| Power consumption (TDP) | 250 Watt | of 2400 (Data Center GPU Max Subsystem) |
| Texture fill rate | 176. 0 |
of 969.9 (h200 SXM5 96 GB) |
| Floating-point performance | 5,632 gflops | of 16384 (Radeon Pro Duo) |
Size and compatibility
This section provides details about the physical dimensions of Radeon R9 290X and its compatibility with other computer components. This information is useful when selecting a computer configuration or upgrading an existing one. For desktop graphics cards, it includes details about the interface and bus (for motherboard compatibility) and additional power connectors (for power supply compatibility).
| Bus support | PCIe 3.0 | |
| Interface | PCIe 3.0 x16 | |
| Length | 275 mm | |
| Width | 2-slot | |
| Supplementary power connectors | 1 x 6-pin + 1 x 8-pin |
Memory
Parameters of memory installed on Radeon R9 290X: its type, size, bus, clock and resulting bandwidth.
Note that GPUs integrated into processors have no dedicated memory and use a shared part of system RAM instead.
| Memory type | GDDR5 | |
| Maximum RAM amount | 4 GB | of 128 (Radeon Instinct MI250X) |
| Memory bus width | 512 Bit | of 8192 (Radeon Instinct MI250X) |
| Memory clock speed | 1250 MHz | of 22400 (GeForce RTX 4080) |
| Memory bandwidth | 320 GB/s | of 3276 (Aldebaran) |
| Shared memory | — |
Video outputs and ports
Types and number of video connectors present on Radeon R9 290X. As a rule, this section is relevant only for desktop reference graphics cards, since for notebook ones the availability of certain video outputs depends on the laptop model, while non-reference desktop models can (though not necessarily will) bear a different set of video ports.
| Display Connectors | 2x DVI, 1x HDMI, 1x DisplayPort | |
| Eyefinity | + | |
| HDMI | + | |
| DisplayPort support | + |
Technologies
Technological solutions and APIs supported by Radeon R9 290X. You’ll probably need this information if you need some particular technology for your purposes.
| AppAcceleration | + | |
| CrossFire | 1 | |
| Enduro | — | |
| FreeSync | 1 | |
| HD3D | + | |
| LiquidVR | 1 | |
| PowerTune | — | |
| TressFX | 1 | |
| TrueAudio | + | |
| ZeroCore | — | |
| UVD | + | |
| DDMA audio | + |
API support
APIs supported by Radeon R9 290X, sometimes including their particular versions.
| DirectX | DirectX® 12 | |
| Shader Model | 6.3 | |
| OpenGL | 4.6 | |
| OpenCL | 2.0 | |
| Vulkan | + | |
| Mantle | — |
Benchmark performance
Synthetic benchmark performance of Radeon R9 290X. The combined score is measured on a 0-100 point scale.
Combined synthetic benchmark score
This is our combined benchmark performance score. We are regularly improving our combining algorithms, but if you find some perceived inconsistencies, feel free to speak up in comments section, we usually fix problems quickly.
R9 290X
18.96
Passmark
This is probably the most ubiquitous benchmark, part of Passmark PerformanceTest suite.
It gives the graphics card a thorough evaluation under various load, providing four separate benchmarks for Direct3D versions 9, 10, 11 and 12 (the last being done in 4K resolution if possible), and few more tests engaging DirectCompute capabilities.
Benchmark coverage: 25%
R9 290X
7425
3DMark Vantage Performance
3DMark Vantage is an outdated DirectX 10 benchmark using 1280×1024 screen resolution. It taxes the graphics card with two scenes, one depicting a girl escaping some militarized base located within a sea cave, the other displaying a space fleet attack on a defenseless planet. It was discontinued in April 2017, and Time Spy benchmark is now recommended to be used instead.
Benchmark coverage: 16%
R9 290X
37284
3DMark 11 Performance GPU
3DMark 11 is an obsolete DirectX 11 benchmark by Futuremark. It used four tests based on two scenes, one being few submarines exploring the submerged wreck of a sunken ship, the other is an abandoned temple deep in the jungle.
All the tests are heavy with volumetric lighting and tessellation, and despite being done in 1280×720 resolution, are relatively taxing. Discontinued in January 2020, 3DMark 11 is now superseded by Time Spy.
Benchmark coverage: 16%
R9 290X
16168
3DMark Fire Strike Score
Benchmark coverage: 13%
R9 290X
9835
3DMark Fire Strike Graphics
Fire Strike is a DirectX 11 benchmark for gaming PCs. It features two separate tests displaying a fight between a humanoid and a fiery creature seemingly made of lava. Using 1920×1080 resolution, Fire Strike shows off some realistic graphics and is quite taxing on hardware.
Benchmark coverage: 13%
R9 290X
11717
3DMark Cloud Gate GPU
Cloud Gate is an outdated DirectX 11 feature level 10 benchmark that was used for home PCs and basic notebooks.
It displays a few scenes of some weird space teleportation device launching spaceships into unknown, using fixed resolution of 1280×720. Just like Ice Storm benchmark, it has been discontinued in January 2020 and replaced by 3DMark Night Raid.
Benchmark coverage: 13%
R9 290X
73987
3DMark Ice Storm GPU
Ice Storm Graphics is an obsolete benchmark, part of 3DMark suite. Ice Storm was used to measure entry level laptops and Windows-based tablets performance. It utilizes DirectX 11 feature level 9 to display a battle between two space fleets near a frozen planet in 1280×720 resolution. Discontinued in January 2020, it is now superseded by 3DMark Night Raid.
Benchmark coverage: 8%
R9 290X
332042
Unigine Heaven 3.0
This is an old DirectX 11 benchmark using Unigine, a 3D game engine by eponymous Russian company. It displays a fantasy medieval town sprawling over several flying islands.
Version 3.0 was released in 2012, and in 2013 it was superseded by Heaven 4.0, which introduced several slight improvements, including a newer version of Unigine.
Benchmark coverage: 4%
R9 290X
140
Unigine Heaven 4.0
This is an old DirectX 11 benchmark, a newer version of Unigine 3.0 with relatively small differences. It displays a fantasy medieval town sprawling over several flying islands. The benchmark is still sometimes used, despite its significant age, as it was released back in 2013.
Benchmark coverage: 1%
R9 290X
1547
Mining hashrates
Cryptocurrency mining performance of Radeon R9 290X. Usually measured in megahashes per second.
| Bitcoin / BTC (SHA256) | 623 Mh/s | |
| Decred / DCR (Decred) | 1.07 Gh/s | |
| Ethereum / ETH (DaggerHashimoto) | 25. 75 Mh/s |
|
| Monero / XMR (CryptoNight) | 0.76 kh/s | |
| Zcash / ZEC (Equihash) | 350 Sol/s |
Gaming performance
Let’s see how good Radeon R9 290X is for gaming. Particular gaming benchmark results are measured in frames per second. Comparisons with game system requirements are included, but remember that sometimes official requirements may reflect reality inaccurately.
Average FPS across all PC games
Here are the average frames per second in a large set of popular modern games across different resolutions:
| Full HD | 87 | |
| 4K | 50 |
Performance in popular games
Relative perfomance
Radeon R9 290X’s performance compared to nearest competitors among desktop video cards.
NVIDIA T1000 8 GB
103.06
AMD Ellesmere
102
AMD Radeon RX 6400
101.16
AMD Radeon R9 290X
100
AMD Radeon RX 570
93.83
AMD Radeon R9 285
89.93
NVIDIA T600
87.61
NVIDIA equivalent
According to our data, the closest NVIDIA alternative to Radeon R9 290X is T1000 8 GB, which is faster by 3% and higher by 10 positions in our ranking.
T1000 8GB
Compare
Here are some closest NVIDIA rivals to Radeon R9 290X:
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650
105.75
NVIDIA T1000
103.
38
NVIDIA T1000 8 GB
103.06
AMD Radeon R9 290X
100
NVIDIA T600
87.61
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 Ti
84.81
NVIDIA GeForce MX570 A
81.49
Similar GPUs
Here is our recommendation of several graphics cards that are more or less close in performance to the one reviewed.
Radeon RX470
Compare
Radeon R9Nano
Compare
GeForce GTX1050 Ti
Compare
Radeon R9380
Compare
Radeon RX480
Compare
GeForce GTX960
Compare
Recommended processors
These processors are most commonly used with Radeon R9 290X according to our statistics.
FX
8350
3.8%
Ryzen 5
2600
2.2%
FX
8320
2.2%
FX
6300
1.9%
Ryzen 5
3600
1.8%
Core i7
3770
1.8%
Core i5
3470
1.6%
Xeon E5
2650 v2
1.5%
Core i5
4460
1.4%
Xeon E5
2689
1.4%
User ratings: view and submit
Here you can see the user rating of the graphics card, as well as rate it yourself.
Questions and comments
Here you can ask a question about Radeon R9 290X, agree or disagree with our judgements, or report an error or mismatch.
Please enable JavaScript to view the comments powered by Disqus.
cover your ears — take off! GECID.com. Page 1
::>Video cards
>2019
> AMD Radeon R9 290X Gameplay vs. GTX 1060: Cover Your Ears, We’re Taking Off!
25-12-2019
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The Radeon R9 290X video card appeared at the end of 2013. It is based on the GPU Hawaii XT, created on the basis of the second generation 28-nm GCN microarchitecture. It has 2816 stream processors, 176 texture units and 64 raster units. The clock frequency is 1000 MHz.
Paired with 4 GB of GDDR5 memory with an effective speed of 5 GHz and a bandwidth of 320 GB / s with a 512-bit bus.
Although later 8-gigabyte versions appeared. But anyway R9The 290X is a really hot and gluttonous graphics card — its TDP reaches almost 300W.
We will renew our acquaintance using the example of SAPPHIRE Radeon R9 290X , provided by the Megabyte store. He does not have an Internet site, but there is a wide selection of computer components.
The video card itself has a reference frequency formula and a reference cooling system. The design of the cooler includes a vapor chamber, an aluminum heatsink and a single 76mm turbine-type fan.
When running the stress test, the cooler runs in balanced mode at about 2200 rpm by default, and the GPU frequency rises to 870 MHz. If you turn the speed up to a maximum of 4700 rpm, then even the Redragon headphones did not save you from noise, and your colleagues fled in horror to the farthest corner of the test lab, clustered together and thought about a revenge plan.
Out of harm’s way in games, they left the cooler in a balanced mode, and in some projects they actually saw the declared 1000 MHz. True, the GPU temperature reached 94°C — you can put the system unit under the table and turn off the heating.
But most of all we were surprised not even by the heating figures, but by the comparison with the current competitor in the face of the 6 GB GTX 1060. cooling system. For reference: the debut of the GTX 1066 took place in mid-2016, and its recommended price at the start of sales reached $29.9. And for the R9 290X in 2013, they asked for $549.
So, in DirectX 11, using the example of Far Cry New Dawn with the maximum graphics preset, the cheaper and colder GTX 1066 deals with the opponent without any problems. The advantage in performance is at least 16%, and we have already thought that we need to take a simpler competitor.
But for curiosity, we launched Strange Brigade in DirectX 12 mode with an ultra preset and did not believe our eyes — R9The 290X made a comeback in average speed and rare events.
Now it is ahead by a maximum of 16%.
The third round of the battle took place in the Vulkan mode on the example of World War Z with an ultra preset. And again, AMD fans have a reason to rejoice — in terms of average speed, the R9 290X pulled ahead, and in other statistics, the GTX 1066 turned out to be faster. Although in both cases the difference does not exceed 2 FPS.
The result is a situation familiar from the Rocky movie — on average, the GTX 1066 retains the advantage due to the huge lead in the first benchmark, but the outsider of this comparison proved to be a real fighter and deserved public recognition.
Now let’s talk about the test stand. To match the video card, they took a far from new and never top-end 8-thread Intel Core i7-7740X processor at face value, with a thermal package of 112 W.
Its cooling was entrusted to the cooler be quiet! DARK ROCK PRO 4, a massive two-section heatsink and a pair of quiet fans can handle 250-watt chips.
Therefore, with this processor, he did not particularly strain.
The motherboard will be «simple» — ASUS TUF X299 MARK 1 ATX format.
The RAM subsystem is represented by four conventional DDR4-2400 sticks from Apacer.
Most of the games and operating system are installed on a pair of Apacer SSDs. For the rest, there’s a hybrid drive from Seagate.
A true gamer must remember two things — winning the battle and keeping the system powered. Girls, sleep and food are secondary. And if the first does not always work out well, then on the second point we are calm thanks to block Super Flower Leadex III Gold 650W with powerful 12V channel and 7 year warranty.
We were also frankly lucky with the case. be quiet! Silent Base 801 not only can accommodate any components, but also immediately provides them with the necessary space and good air circulation due to three pre-installed turntables.
The Redragon brand helped us with peripherals. After two tests, there were more live impressions. The Redragon Indrah mechanical keyboard with a Skeleton-type design pleased with a solid case assembly, which consists of a metal top plate and a plastic bottom one. True, she is quite branded.
The Redragon Cobra feels like the Razer DeathAdder and HyperX PulseFire FPS. It has nice ergonomics, especially for right-handers with an average palm size. The optimal grip is a claw or palm.
The Redragon Archelon mousepad was used to quickly move the mouse.
But the Redragon Lagopasmutus headphones helped to focus on the game without being distracted by extraneous sounds.
Gameplay recorded by external system with AVerMedia Live Gamer 4K.
Jokes are jokes, and the gameplay itself will not comment. Launch World of Tanks with ultra settings. Even on a light tank, you can successfully maneuver and punish opponents, if not with your own firepower, then with the support of your allies.
The video buffer is enough with a margin, and you are not afraid of any friezes.
“We are going, we are going, we are going to distant lands!” This is how we can briefly describe our gaming experience in War Thunder at the maximum preset. The appearance of careless opponents only strengthened the positive impressions of the gameplay: on experience, they were able to upset the adversaries. Average speed increased to 95 fps.
With the medium preset ARK Survival Evolved automatically reduces the rendering scale to about 66%, and the picture turns out to be soapy. We decided to manually raise it to 100%: there will be light friezes in any case, and if they do suffer, then at least for a clear future perspective.
Radeon R9 290X [in 9 benchmarks]
Description
AMD started Radeon R9 290X sales on October 24, 2013 at a suggested price of $549. This is a desktop video card based on GCN architecture and 28 nm manufacturing process, primarily aimed at gamers.
It has 4 GB of GDDR5 memory at 1.25 GHz, and coupled with a 512-bit interface, this creates a bandwidth of 320 Gb / s.
In terms of compatibility, this is a two-slot PCIe 3.0 x16 card. The length of the reference version is 275 mm. An additional 1 x 6-pin + 1 x 8-pin power cable is required for connection, and the power consumption is 250 watts.
It provides poor performance in tests and games at the level of
18.96%
from the leader, which is the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090.
GeForce RTX 4090
Compare
General Information
Information about the type (desktop or laptop) and architecture of the Radeon R9 290X, as well as when sales started and cost at the time.
| Performance ranking | 240 | |
| Value for money | ||
| Architecture | GCN (2011-2017) | |
| GPU | 9 0160 Hawaii XT | |
| Type | Desktop | |
| 4 | ||
| Release price | $549 | |
| Current price | 901 $60,210 (0. 4x) |
of 168889 (A100 PCIe 80 GB) |
Value for money
Performance to price ratio. The higher the better.
Features
Radeon R9 290X’s general performance parameters such as number of shaders, GPU core clock, manufacturing process, texturing and calculation speed. They indirectly talk about Radeon R9 performance290X, but for an accurate assessment, you need to consider the results of benchmarks and gaming tests.
| Number of stream processors | 2816 | of 20480 (Data Center GPU Max NEXT) |
| Boost frequency | 947 MHz | out of 3599 (Radeon RX 7990 XTX ) |
| Number of transistors | 6.200 million | of 14400 (GeForce GTX 1080 SLI (Mobile)) |
| Process | 28nm | of 4 (GeForce RTX 4080) |
| Power consumption (TDP) | 250 W (h 200 SXM5 96 GB) | |
| Floating point performance | 5. 632 gflops |
of 16384 (Radeon Pro Duo) |
Compatibility and dimensions 9014 1
Information on Radeon R9 290X compatibility with other computer components. Useful for example when choosing the configuration of a future computer or to upgrade an existing one. For desktop video cards, these are the interface and connection bus (compatibility with the motherboard), the physical dimensions of the video card (compatibility with the motherboard and case), additional power connectors (compatibility with the power supply).
| Bus | PCIe 3.0 | |
| Interface | PCIe 3.0 x16 | |
| Length | 275mm | |
| Thickness | 2 slots | |
| Additional power connectors | 1 x 6-pin + 1 x 8-pin | 90 181 |
RAM
Parameters of the memory installed on Radeon R9 290X — type, size, bus, frequency and bandwidth.
For video cards built into the processor that do not have their own memory, a shared part of the RAM is used.
| Memory type | GDDR5 | |
| Maximum memory | 901 60 4 GB | of 128 (Radeon Instinct MI250X) |
| Memory bus width | 512 bits | of 8192 (Radeon Instinct MI250X) | Memory frequency | 1250 MHz | of 22400 (GeForce RTX 4080) |
| Memory bandwidth | 320Gb/s | of 3276 (Aldebaran) |
| Shared memory |
Video outputs
Types and number of video connectors present on Radeon R9 290X. As a rule, this section is relevant only for desktop reference video cards, since for laptop ones the availability of certain video outputs depends on the laptop model.
| Video connectors | 2x DVI, 1x HDMI, 1x DisplayPort | |
| Eyefinity 9 0175 | + | |
| HDMI | + | |
| DisplayPort support | 901 60 + |
Technology
Technology and APIs supported by Radeon R9 290X are listed here. You will need this information if your video card is required to support specific technologies.
| AppAcceleration | + | ||
| CrossFire | 1 0175
| — |
|
|
| FreeSync | |||
| HD3D | + | ||
| LiquidVR | 1 | ||
| — | |||
| 174 TrueAudio | + | ||
| ZeroCore | — | 90 175 | |
| UVD | + | ||
| Audio DDMA | + |
API 9 support0141
APIs supported by Radeon R9 290X, including their versions.
| DirectX | DirectX® 12 | ||||||||||||||||||
| Shader model | OpenGL | 4.6 | |||||||||||||||||
| OpenCL | 2.0 | ||||||||||||||||||
| Vulkan | + | ||||||||||||||||||
4
Benchmark testsThese are the results of Radeon R9 290X rendering performance tests in non-gaming benchmarks. The overall score is set from 0 to 100, where 100 corresponds to the fastest video card at the moment. Overall benchmark performanceThis is our overall performance rating. We regularly improve our algorithms, but if you find any inconsistencies, feel free to speak up in the comments section, we usually fix problems quickly.
R9 290X Passmark This is a very common benchmark included in the Passmark PerformanceTest package. Benchmark coverage: 25%
R9 290X 3DMark Vantage Performance3DMark Vantage is an outdated DirectX 10 benchmark. It loads the graphics card with two scenes, one of a girl running away from some kind of military base located in a sea cave, and the other of a space fleet attacking defenseless planet. Support for 3DMark Vantage was discontinued in April 2017 and it is now recommended to use the Time Spy benchmark instead. Benchmark coverage: 16%
R9 290X 3DMark 11 Performance GPU 3DMark 11 is Futuremark’s legacy DirectX 11 benchmark. He used four tests based on two scenes: one is several submarines exploring a sunken ship, the other is an abandoned temple deep in the jungle. Benchmark coverage: 16%
R9 290X 3DMark Fire Strike ScoreBenchmark coverage: 13%
R9 290X 3DMark Fire Strike GraphicsFire Strike is a DirectX 11 benchmark for gaming PCs. It features two separate tests showing a fight between a humanoid and a fiery creature that appears to be made of lava. Using resolution 1920×1080, Fire Strike shows quite realistic graphics and is quite demanding on hardware. Benchmark coverage: 13%
R9 290X 3DMark Cloud Gate GPU Cloud Gate is a legacy benchmark that uses DirectX 11 feature level 10, used to test home PCs and low-end laptops. It displays several scenes of some strange teleportation device launching spaceships into the unknown at a fixed resolution of 1280×720. Benchmark coverage: 13%
R9 290X 3DMark Ice Storm GPUIce Storm Graphics is an obsolete benchmark, part of the 3DMark package. Ice Storm has been used to measure the performance of entry-level laptops and Windows-based tablets. It uses DirectX 11 feature level 9 to render a battle between two space fleets near a frozen planet at 1280×720 resolution. Support for Ice Storm ended in January 2020, now the developers recommend using Night Raid instead. Benchmark coverage: 8%
R9 290X Unigine Heaven 3.0 This is an old DirectX 11 based benchmark using the Unigine 3D game engine from the Russian company of the same name. It depicts a medieval fantasy city spread over several floating islands. Version 3.0 was released in 2012 and was replaced by Heaven 4. Benchmark coverage: 4%
R9 290X Unigine Heaven 4.0This is an old DirectX 11 based benchmark, a newer version of Unigine 3.0 with relatively minor differences. It depicts a medieval fantasy city spread over several floating islands. The benchmark is still occasionally used despite its considerable age, and it was released back in 2013. Benchmark coverage: 1%
R9 290X Mining hashratesRadeon R9 290X performance in cryptocurrency mining. Usually the result is measured in mhash / s — the number of millions of solutions generated by the video card in one second.
Radeon R9 290X in gamesFPS in popular games on Radeon R9290X, as well as compliance with system requirements. Remember that the official requirements of the developers do not always match the data of real tests. Average FPSHere are the average FPS values for a large selection of popular games at different resolutions:
Popular gamesRelative capacityOverall Radeon R9 290X performance compared to its closest competitors in desktop graphics cards.
NVIDIA T1000 8GB
AMD Ellesmere
AMD Radeon RX 6400
AMD Radeon R9 290X
AMD Radeon RX 570
AMD Radeon R9 285
NVIDIA T600 Competitor from NVIDIAThe closest competitor of Radeon R9 290X from NVIDIA is T1000 8 GB, which is 3% faster on average and higher by 10 positions in our rating. T1000 8 GB Compare Here are some NVIDIA Radeon R9 290X closest competitors:
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650
NVIDIA T1000
NVIDIA T1000 8GB
AMD Radeon R9 290X
NVIDIA T600
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 Ti
NVIDIA GeForce MX570A Other video cardsHere we recommend several video cards that are more or less similar in performance to the reviewed one. Radeon RX 470 Compare Radeon R9 Nano Compare GeForce GTX 1050 Ti Compare Radeon R9 380 Compare Radeon RX 480 Compare GeForce GTX 960 Compare Recommended processorsAccording to our statistics, these processors are most often used with the Radeon R9 290X. 3.8% 2.2% 2.2% 1.9% 1. |
He gives the card a thorough evaluation, running four separate tests for Direct3D versions 9, 10, 11, and 12 (the latter being done at 4K resolution whenever possible), and a few more tests using DirectCompute. 
All tests make extensive use of volumetric lighting and tessellation and, despite being run at 1280×720, are relatively heavy. Support for 3DMark 11 ended in January 2020 and is now being replaced by Time Spy. 
As with the Ice Storm benchmark, it was deprecated in January 2020 and 3DMark Night Raid is now recommended instead. 
0 in 2013, which introduced several minor improvements, including a newer version of the Unigine engine. 
75 Mh/s 
16
49
