ASUS Radeon R9-290X DirectCU II OC review - Introduction

Heck Yea ... the  ASUS Radeon R9 290X DirectCU II OC

We review the ASUS Radeon R9 290X DirectCU II OC edition. A lot of you guys have been waiting on a custom cooled version of this product. Armed with the latest revision of the DirectCU II the cooler and will get that 2816 Stream processor based Hawaii chip with and 4 GB GDDR5 memory running along a 512-bit memory interface. The DirectCU II card will be equipped with a fully custom PCB design featuring the Digi+ VRM with Super Alloy Power technology and high quality C-Caps and MOSFETs. The card is powered through 8-Pin + 6-Pin power configuration and obviously runs at factory overclocked specifications. The card can Boost towards 1050 MHz and is clocked to 5400 MHz (effective) in the GDDR5 memory.

Some keywords for this review as a small appetizer; 6 Billion transistors on a 438 mm² Die, 512-bit Memory bus with 4 GB - 5.0 Gbps GDDR5 memory, Ultra HD ready, 5.6 TFLOPS of compute performance. Not bad for keywords, eh? AMD is partnering with EA's Battlefield 4, meaning that for as long as the coupons are available, you will receive Battlefield 4 with the card for certain selected SKUs. That would be a deluxe edition with extra DLC and weapons. AMD also is focusing strongly at gaming in Ultra High Definition (UHD), so this will be a focus in our review as well. Will we be able to play the hottest games at that whopping 8.2 Mpixels at a 3840x2160 resolution @ 60 Hz.

The ASUS DirectCU II OC edition card is tweaked a little for ya, see it can Boost towards 1050 MHz and is clocked to 5400 MHz (effective) in the GDDR5 memory. These cards are little beasts. As such this in-depth review will cover the Volcanic Islands GPU architecture, Hawaii for the 290 series, we'll benchmark these cards with FCAT Frametimes, Ultra High Definition and of course, we'll check out game performance with the latest games next to power consumption and heat levels as well. This is one review you don't wanna miss, have a peek and then head on over to the next page please.