PowerColor Radeon R9 390 PCS+ 8GB review

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MSI one seems to perform a good deal better.
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Still heaps cheaper than a GTX 980 and performs roughly the same. Where it seems to really lag, driver updates should help.
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Sometimes I get the feeling Nvidia is deliberately leaving market segments for AMD to grab, even if it's hard to believe since they tend to be greedy scumbags. I mean performs the same as a 980, yet 200$ cheaper. That's great value.
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Sometimes I get the feeling Nvidia is deliberately leaving market segments for AMD to grab, even if it's hard to believe since they tend to be greedy scumbags. I mean performs the same as a 980, yet 200$ cheaper. That's great value.
That doesn't make any sense. What is more logical is; AMD knows they have something that performs similar (depending on the game) to the 980 and decides to undercut Nvidia by quite a bit (which just eats into their margins), what does that have to do with nvidia "deliberately leaving market segments for AMD to grab"?
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That doesn't make any sense. What is more logical is; AMD knows they have something that performs similar (depending on the game) to the 980 and decides to undercut Nvidia by quite a bit (which just eats into their margins), what does that have to do with nvidia "deliberately leaving market segments for AMD to grab"?
I wouldn't say nvidia is deliberately leaving market segments, but for the past 8 years or so they've been consistently and significantly more expensive than AMD, whether they were #1 or not. Even though nvidia currently own the crown for best overall performance and best performance-per-watt, that's no excuse for their GPUs to cost so much.
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I wouldn't say nvidia is deliberately leaving market segments, but for the past 8 years or so they've been consistently and significantly more expensive than AMD, whether they were #1 or not. Even though nvidia currently own the crown for best overall performance and best performance-per-watt, that's no excuse for their GPUs to cost so much.
They have value-added features. I mean you can argue that you don't value those features, but they do exist and clearly the majority of the market (75%) value those to the point of buying their GPU's despite the cost difference.
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They have value-added features. I mean you can argue that you don't value those features, but they do exist and clearly the majority of the market (75%) value those to the point of buying their GPU's despite the cost difference.
Other than the CUDA cores (and physx, which is CUDA based), what other features does nvidia offer that is unique to them? Most things they have, there is an AMD or open source alternative. Maybe not as polished, but still decent. Actually as of today, I'd say AMD currently has more features that are unique to them, like eyefinity (not sure if nvidia has an equivalent to that), Mantle, and TressFX. I'm not saying those are sought-after features, but my point is, I can't think of any features exclusive to nvidia that people want (that have no alternative). EDIT: For the record, I don't dislike nvidia. I bought as many nvidia GPUs as I've bought AMD/ATi.
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Other than the CUDA cores (and physx, which is CUDA based), what other features does nvidia offer that is unique to them? Most things they have, there is an AMD or open source alternative. Maybe not as polished, but still decent. Actually as of today, I'd say AMD currently has more features that are unique to them, like eyefinity (not sure if nvidia has an equivalent to that), Mantle, and TressFX. I'm not saying those are sought-after features, but my point is, I can't think of any features exclusive to nvidia that people want (that have no alternative).
Eyefinity is pretty much just a multiple monitor setup (Nvidia Surround). With 4k and even higher on the rise on a single monitor, Nvidia Surround and Eyefinity really aren't used as much anymore. And yes AMD has other features such as Mantle or TressFX, however these aren't features that are widely used. Whereas with Nvidia, there are really only 2 main features. That's Cuda(which a good amount of programs use), and Physx(Not a whole lot use Physx, but a major game engine does). Nvidia does also have HDMI 2.0 support for 4k at 60hz on the 970, 980, and ti I believe? That being said, none of these features Nvidia has aren't important to me at least. 😀 Waiting on my Fury X to come in!
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Other than the CUDA cores (and physx, which is CUDA based), what other features does nvidia offer that is unique to them? Most things they have, there is an AMD or open source alternative. Maybe not as polished, but still decent. Actually as of today, I'd say AMD currently has more features that are unique to them, like eyefinity (not sure if nvidia has an equivalent to that), Mantle, and TressFX. I'm not saying those are sought-after features, but my point is, I can't think of any features exclusive to nvidia that people want (that have no alternative). EDIT: For the record, I don't dislike nvidia. I bought as many nvidia GPUs as I've bought AMD/ATi.
Physx is about the only thing I can think of. I have used both Radeon and Nvidia off and on now since 2008. Nvidia has surround which is their version of eyefinity. Eyefinity is much more poished and feature savy imho. Have used both. Most of Nvidias features are nvidia only crap honestly. Nvidias gpus are quite over priced IMHO. Been that way since the 8800 gtx launched. Back when the X1900xtx was out and kicking the hell out of the 7900gtx, especially in DX9c games with HDR lighting and MSAA Nvidia was way more balanced in price point. Plus Radeon gpus since the HD 7 series really hold their life longer. Just look at the HD 7950/70 R9 280/280x series of gpus. 280x is competing with the GTX 780 in alot of games now.
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That doesn't make any sense. What is more logical is; AMD knows they have something that performs similar (depending on the game) to the 980 and decides to undercut Nvidia by quite a bit (which just eats into their margins), what does that have to do with nvidia "deliberately leaving market segments for AMD to grab"?
Come on, let's say you have a product and your competitor offers the same product at a better price. You as an owner WILL drop the price in order to stay competitive, otherwise you lose more than you gain. Nvidia isn't doing this for some reason. I mean the 980 has to be one of the least sold cards in their current lineup. At least currently. I know it sold plenty when it first appeared. They are greedy faks but I don't think they're actually hoping to sell more 980s.
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Looks like a good card to me. Having the cut down R9 390 beat the R9 290x is excellent. However, since I already have a R9 290 reference from November, 2013 and I just spent money on a new 4k monitor, these cards are not in my radar at the moment. (None are really though.)
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Other than the CUDA cores (and physx, which is CUDA based), what other features does nvidia offer that is unique to them? Most things they have, there is an AMD or open source alternative. Maybe not as polished, but still decent. Actually as of today, I'd say AMD currently has more features that are unique to them, like eyefinity (not sure if nvidia has an equivalent to that), Mantle, and TressFX. I'm not saying those are sought-after features, but my point is, I can't think of any features exclusive to nvidia that people want (that have no alternative). EDIT: For the record, I don't dislike nvidia. I bought as many nvidia GPUs as I've bought AMD/ATi.
I mean for the most part now, AMD has feature parity with a bunch of stuff and vice versa. But in the past, at some point, Nvidia, in random order, had: CUDA/PhysX, MFAA, HDMI 2.0, VXGI, VR Direct, Asynchronous Warp for VR, G-Sync, Geforce Experience, Shadow Play, DSR, Game Streaming (To Shield Stuff), i'm sure more stuff that I can't think of.. but yeah Nvidia had/has most of those either first or currently exclusively (MFAA for example, AMD had something similar but dropped it). I personally know one person that bought a 780Ti over a 290x because of Shadow Play alone.
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For that price its a way better deal than the 980, and just overclock it a bit and you get about the same performance for $200 less, physx is not worth $200 more.. I'm aiming at this card for my next purchase unless the fury nano offers a lot more.
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I wouldn't say nvidia is deliberately leaving market segments, but for the past 8 years or so they've been consistently and significantly more expensive than AMD, whether they were #1 or not. Even though nvidia currently own the crown for best overall performance and best performance-per-watt, that's no excuse for their GPUs to cost so much.
No excuse? high-end graphics cards have always been 500-600 dollars for the past, what? 10-15 years? and that's on both sides of the graphics war, it is recent that Nvidia has been bringing out "higher" then high end cards, yes, and those cost an arm and a leg, so what does that have to do with anything? And AMD has done it as well.
Come on, let's say you have a product and your competitor offers the same product at a better price. You as an owner WILL drop the price in order to stay competitive, otherwise you lose more than you gain. Nvidia isn't doing this for some reason. I mean the 980 has to be one of the least sold cards in their current lineup. At least currently. I know it sold plenty when it first appeared. They are greedy faks but I don't think they're actually hoping to sell more 980s.
Because they don't have to? again i'm not seeing the logic here in your original statement or your new one. AMD is undercutting them to get people to buy their product, this is what AMD has been doing for the past who knows how many years with both Nvidia and Intel, and for the most part it's worked for them to "stay afloat", but AMD is cutting into their margins to do it. Why would Nvidia cut into their Margins, if they don't have to? And they don't, the people who buy AMD cards because they are cheaper but perform the same(ish) are not that many people because of what Nvidia has exclusive to them, as well as what nvidia has driver wise (i really don't care if someone says "oh i won't have driver issues with my AMD card" because you are not the norm even if you don't want to believe it) But my point, in the end, is why would nvidia lower their prices when they don't have to? that's the only question needed answering, because nvidia doesn't have to match AMD, but AMD does NEED to undercut nvidia, that's how the tables are turned currently
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Other than the CUDA cores (and physx, which is CUDA based), what other features does nvidia offer that is unique to them? Most things they have, there is an AMD or open source alternative. Maybe not as polished, but still decent. Actually as of today, I'd say AMD currently has more features that are unique to them, like eyefinity (not sure if nvidia has an equivalent to that), Mantle, and TressFX. I'm not saying those are sought-after features, but my point is, I can't think of any features exclusive to nvidia that people want (that have no alternative). EDIT: For the record, I don't dislike nvidia. I bought as many nvidia GPUs as I've bought AMD/ATi.
Well..It's not "Unique" to nvidia,but AMD doesn't use it(Except in Civ V). Command Lists
The way that DX11 was supposed to achieve this was by using Deferred Contexts in combination with Command Lists. NVIDIA suppors both, AMD does not support Command Lists...
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MSI one seems to perform a good deal better.
Comparing to the 390x msi one we have as the other 390 card in the review? 😯
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No excuse? high-end graphics cards have always been 500-600 dollars for the past, what? 10-15 years? and that's on both sides of the graphics war, it is recent that Nvidia has been bringing out "higher" then high end cards, yes, and those cost an arm and a leg, so what does that have to do with anything? And AMD has done it as well. Because they don't have to? again i'm not seeing the logic here in your original statement or your new one. AMD is undercutting them to get people to buy their product, this is what AMD has been doing for the past who knows how many years with both Nvidia and Intel, and for the most part it's worked for them to "stay afloat", but AMD is cutting into their margins to do it. Why would Nvidia cut into their Margins, if they don't have to? And they don't, the people who buy AMD cards because they are cheaper but perform the same(ish) are not that many people because of what Nvidia has exclusive to them, as well as what nvidia has driver wise (i really don't care if someone says "oh i won't have driver issues with my AMD card" because you are not the norm even if you don't want to believe it) But my point, in the end, is why would nvidia lower their prices when they don't have to? that's the only question needed answering, because nvidia doesn't have to match AMD, but AMD does NEED to undercut nvidia, that's how the tables are turned currently
Also, Nvidia usually just release a new GPU to make an old GPU obsolete (980Ti for example, so much more for +$100), rather then price cutting. That way, they make their new GPU seem better because it's dominating their previous expensive GPU. Also yes AMD have to be the "value village" of GPUS and CPUS because for CPUS, they're behind on hardware and with GPUs their behind on software (drivers, features etc). I don't know how they've stayed afloat this long TBH. I thought Bulldozer would've been the end of them competing in enthusiast GPU and CPU markets. R&D must be destroying them.
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No excuse? high-end graphics cards have always been 500-600 dollars for the past, what? 10-15 years? and that's on both sides of the graphics war, it is recent that Nvidia has been bringing out "higher" then high end cards, yes, and those cost an arm and a leg, so what does that have to do with anything? And AMD has done it as well. Because they don't have to? again i'm not seeing the logic here in your original statement or your new one. AMD is undercutting them to get people to buy their product, this is what AMD has been doing for the past who knows how many years with both Nvidia and Intel, and for the most part it's worked for them to "stay afloat", but AMD is cutting into their margins to do it. Why would Nvidia cut into their Margins, if they don't have to? And they don't, the people who buy AMD cards because they are cheaper but perform the same(ish) are not that many people because of what Nvidia has exclusive to them, as well as what nvidia has driver wise (i really don't care if someone says "oh i won't have driver issues with my AMD card" because you are not the norm even if you don't want to believe it) But my point, in the end, is why would nvidia lower their prices when they don't have to? that's the only question needed answering, because nvidia doesn't have to match AMD, but AMD does NEED to undercut nvidia, that's how the tables are turned currently
Yes, I see your point but as a competitor if Nvidia were to lower prices they would completely obliterate AMD. That's what I meant. Clarification: In a normal situation they'd battle to the death with aggressive prices and good hardware. It would make a lot of sense to deny AMD marketshare growth, even if their marketshare is rather slim to start with. At this point Nvidia could even outright kill AMD if they were to lower prices, but obviously that doesn't make a lot of sense. When I say kill I mean by lowering their prices drastically, to a point where AMD is almost bleeding money. Understand what I mean?
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For that price its a way better deal than the 980, and just overclock it a bit and you get about the same performance for $200 less, physx is not worth $200 more.. I'm aiming at this card for my next purchase unless the fury nano offers a lot more.
considering what's going in the market right now with AMD cards such as being behind driver support, developer support (look at the Batman Arkham Knight fiasco with AMD cards), lack of features and performance in Witcher 3, if you put it in terms of value, the 970/980 is a better card for whichever it's compared to despite being more expensive. i'll take that over poor support.
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considering what's going in the market right now with AMD cards such as being behind driver support, developer support (look at the Batman Arkham Knight fiasco with AMD cards), lack of features and performance in Witcher 3, if you put it in terms of value, the 970/980 is a better card for whichever it's compared to despite being more expensive. i'll take that over poor support.
Then there is Shield gaming with Grid and Game Stream. Something I use quite often.