While all the spotlight is on the latest AMD Fury line of graphic cards, AMD has also updated a bunch of their other cards to cater to the much more demanding mid to uppermidrange market. This includes revamping their existing cards, namely the Hawaii chipset to get more out of them. Paired with the released of Microsoft’s latest OS, Windows 10, it should squeeze out more performance out of a reliable baseline. One of the refreshed GPU is the R9 390X. Rated just below the Fury range of graphic card, would this card prove you can still teach an old dog new tricks? Let's find out.
CHROMA ORANGE
The R9 390X that we have received is from Sapphire, one of the more well known third party manufacturer that has always produced AMD’s products. The box is rather large, and its chrome orange scheme would certainly turn a few heads.
The packaging for Sapphire graphics cards hasn't changed much over the years, so the Tri-X 390X's box isn't any different. You will be greeted by a rather unassuming cardboard box, which in turn contains the graphic card tightly packed in a foam enclosure, as well as another cardboard box with a driver dvd, a Sapphire sticker, a quick user guide manual, and a 1.8m HDMI cable inside.
TRIFECTA
Taking the Sapphire R9 390X out of it’s bubble wrap haven, one would immediately notice its rather heavy weight. Indeed, this card is tall and heavy. It looks great though, with its fully black shroud and minimal chrome orange details. The Tri-X from its name refers to the three very large fans on the card that help dissipate heat faster, while making sure that the card itself remains quiet.
The aluminium heatsink donates to the bulk of the weight and juts out about 10cm longer than the PCB itself. Sapphire’s heatsink and cooling combo is one of the best on the market for AMD third party cards, and it shows here. The card itself feels rather sturdy, even when you are holding it by the shroud, which usually flexes on any other card. The only thing we feel lacking is an aluminium backplate, something of a norm for a card of this weight and stature. Maybe Sapphire feels that the card is tough enough not to bend, but it does rather take away from the whole premium feel.
CROSSING THE STREAM
The Sapphire AMD R9 390X Tri-X is based on the Hawaii XT R9 290X, so you should see some similar specs. It's based on the 28nm process and has a 250W TDP. Sapphire states that the card is overclocked out of the box, and it does run at 1,005 Mhz, instead of the reference 1,000 Mhz speed; to be honest, we expected a much higher overclock speed here. It has 64 ROPs and the memory is clocked at 1,500Mhz (6Gbps effective), higher than the 5Gbps on the R9 290X.
One of the most apparent upgrade of the R9 390X, compared to the R9 290X, is the inclusion of 8GB of GDDR5 VRAM. Not surprising, especially with 4K resolution gaming on the rise and 4K resolution monitors getting cheaper. It's also not surprising to see that the R9 390X Tri-X needs two 4-pin GPU power connectors to work. As with all newer AMD model, there is no crossfire pin for multi GPU setup anymore.
4K ON HDMI? NOPE!
On the rear of the card, the Sapphire R9 390X Tri-X features a single DVI-Dual Link connector, three DisplayPort 1.2a and a single HDMI 1.4a connector. Note that HDMI 1.4a does not support 4K over HDMI at 60Hz, meaning that you won’t really want to do gaming over HDMI, unless you are happy to be playing at low refresh rates. It’s an ironic thing, considering that the card IS targeted for 4K gaming and for most people 60FPS and 60Hz is the bare minimum.
The three DisplayPort connectors meanwhile meant that you can configure three monitors for AMD eyefinity surround. You can even daisy chain three more for six monitors. The Sapphire R9 390X Tri-X also support AMD’s freesync, which when used with the appropriate monitor will sync the monitor’s refresh rate with the game’s frame rate. No more screen tearing, or having to turn on VSYNC and experience sluggishness.
TESTING AND THOUGHTS
We tested the Sapphire R9 390X Tri-X and we were really blown away by its performance. Most of the games were set on High/Extreme graphics, and we are happy to report that we could play those games at a high framerate (>60FPS) constantly at full HD resolution. We tried to overclock the card with MSI afterburner and managed a stable clock of only a tad over 1,100Mhz, which is quite disappointing considering that it has a good cooling and needed only two 4-pin power connectors. But even at stock, it’s still one beast of a card.
If you are looking for a new powerful card, and the Fury is out of your reach, well then you might want to give the Sapphire R9 390X Tri-X a try. It’s fast, it’s cool, and it also supports the new Directx12 that comes with Windows 10. It should be a blast.
VERDICT
Can’t wait to get me a 4K monitor to pair with this.
SPECS
CHIP AMD RADEON R9 390X
VRAM GDDR5 8GB
CLOCKSPEED 1,005 Mhz
MEMORY CLOCKSPEED 6,000 MHz
OUTPUT DVI x1, HDMI x1, DP x3