Radeon R9-290 Crossfire review - Article

AMD Radeon R9 290 Crossfire (2-way) review

We review the Radeon R9-290 setup in two way Crossfire and start comparing a bit with GeForce GTX 780 SLI, next to our default FPS benchmarks we will also perform Ultra HD and FCAT Frametime measurements. Over the next few pages we'll tell you a bit about multi-GPU gaming, the challenges, the requirements and of course a nice tasty benchmark session with the latest games. We'll have a peek at temperatures and power consumption of the Radeon cards in Crossfire mode to monitor its generated performance.

We feel that the regular R9-290 will be the actual sweet-spot for those that wish to follow the multi-GPU route. AMD injected the product very aggressively in the 289 EUR (ex VAt) price tag bracket making the product cheaper opposed to the GeForce GTX 780. And that makes the GTX 780 the primary competition. Both the 780 and 290 cards haul massive azz when it comes to sheer performance performance, but what if you pair them up on SLI and Crossfire ? From both vendors we actually have two cards of each in house, the R9-290 that comes from AMD and from NVIDIA the GeForce GTX 780. All cards are reference clocked products. So that means that AIB card that are factory overclocked will be a hint (typically up top 10%) faster. For AMD R9 290/290X you may expect custom boards later in Q4, likely end November or December 2013.

We'll setup the two cards up in multi-GPU mode (2-way) clock them standard and test multi-GPU performance -- taking it to the next level -- multi-GPU gaming. In this review we'll show you a little about the technology and the GPU itself of course. More interestingly, we'll have a look at Crossfire performance. As if you figured just one card would be interesting, you have no idea what's coming at you with two cards. With UHD (Ultra High Definition Gaming) becoming rapidly popular we'll also test the multi-GPU setups on such a monitor. Next to that we'll perform FCAT tests to see where AMD is early Autumn anno 2013 in terms of micro-stuttering and frame pacing.

Have a peek at the offering, and then march onward into the review, but not before you've said Aloha towards the two Hawaii Pro GPU based R9 290'ies.