MSI Radeon R9-290X Gaming OC review - Introduction

Meet da mighty MSI Radeon R9-290X Gaming OC edition

We review the MSI Radeon R9-290X Gaming OC. The cards equipped with that Hawaii GPU now is proper cooled thanks to the TwinFrozr cooler and steadily running and purring at just over 70 Degrees C, that's under full gaming load. The 2816 Stream processor based Hawaii chip will get paired with 4 GB GDDR5 memory running along a 512-bit memory interface. The card itself is fully customized including component selection, custom PCB, custom cooling, well .. custom everything ! Powered through 8-Pin + 6-Pin power configuration it obviously runs at factory overclocked specifications as well. The card will clock towards 1040 MHz bit is clocked at reference clocks on the GDDR5 memory. 

So what does a Hawaii GPU bring into the garphics cards ? Oh what about 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 MSI Radeon R9-290X Gaming OC edition card is tweaked a little for you though, see it can Boost towards 1040 MHz though is clocked to 5000 MHz (effective) on the GDDR5 memory, the all custom PCB is being cooled with the TwinFrozr cooler. 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.