[JayzTwoCents] R9 390 vs GTX970 - Claims 300 series is NOT a rebrand - R9 390 new mid tier king?

[Techhog]

Man.... if he standardized it to all Twin Frozr 4 or 5 cards, he could also prove that GCN 1.1 Hawaii does or does not run as hot as Maxwell cards.

390 and 390X have a beefier TF5 cooler than any Maxwell cards, even the 980 Ti. Don't ask me why they wouldn't put the beefy cooler on the 980 Ti, but they didn't.

[othertomperson]

 

For the hundredth time, they did not raise prices. They are new products and the prices were set logically according to their competition.

 

That happened back in October when the 970 competed with the 290X for half the price. Like I've already said, the 390 is an overclocked 290 but being sold back at the same MSRP it had nearly two years ago. A two year old product being sold as if it were new is a price rise.

 

Not clock for clock obviously ( 4.6 4690k might very well beat a 4.2 or lower 5960x). That's what broadwell is capable of (in fact on some games stock broadwell beat 5960x at 4.2).

 

No, clock for clock they are the same. A 5960X has more cache, more PCIe lanes, can address more RAM, uses DDR4 and it has more cores and hyperthreading but it's still essentially Haswell. It still has basically the same IPC. None of the things that make it a better and more expensive CPU have any impact on gaming performance.

 

 

I'm done.

 

Good. I don't have time for you going so far out of your way to defend these business practices. In the end the consumer loses out from AMD lying like this.

[Ivo]

Either you work every day 24/7 to be able to live normally , or you have a lot of connections ... 

 

PC stuff aint cheap here .... correction , nothing is cheap here .

I know, I am from there that's why I'm asking

[MEC-777]

The fact remains though that they're rebrands; the poll doesn't mean anything in that regard.

 

Depends on how you define "rebrand". I would argue they are not merely rebrands and here we go all over again.

 

 

That happened back in October when the 970 competed with the 290X for half the price. Like I've already said, the 390 is an overclocked 290 but being sold back at the same MSRP it had nearly two years ago. A two year old product being sold as if it were new is a price rise.

 

The 290/x was initially meant to compete with the 780/Ti, not the 900 series. The 390/x are directly aimed at the 900 series and are more than merely OC'd versions of the old cards. Even though they use the same GPU die (albeit binned chips) they are physically new "cards" (with many design improvements/changes made) and they are being sold as what they are - new products. Those are the facts. 

 

Also, AMD has not lied about the 390 series at all. Not once did they claim these were to be brand new GPU cores with a brand new architecture and be much faster than the 290 series. Not once. But they are "new cards" and again, being sold as such for competitive prices relative to the competition. 

 

I really struggle to see why some people are having such a hard time understanding this. 

[ivan134]

They have been reusing them (it's a fact) also I didn't say they are in the 300 series. These are the cards which they have reused.

Hd 7790 - r7 260x

hd 7850 -  r7 265 - r7 370

hd 7870 - r9 270/x

hd 7950 - r9 280

hd 7970 - r9 280x

Not to mention that the other cards in the 300 series (380 and 390/x) are also refreshes/rebrands.

 

When I said reuse, I meant 7000 cards making into the 300 series. 7850 is the only one.

[MEC-777]

On a somewhat related note, I see Gigabyte has shown their new R9 390/x Gaming G1 cards. They are now using a brand new windforce 2x cooler with 2 fans. Surprising to see on a Hawaii based chip, considering their 970, 980 and 980Ti all use a larger 3 fan cooler. Gigabyte also boasts passive cooling at idle and low-loads as well as their "gauntlet" GPU binning process - very curious to see how far these will OC.

 

Card looks great, IMO and is clearly not the same card as their previous 290 series with the windforce 3x cooler.

 

[othertomperson]

The 290/x was initially meant to compete with the 780/Ti, not the 900 series. The 390/x are directly aimed at the 900 series and are more than merely OC'd versions of the old cards. Even though they use the same GPU die (albeit binned chips) they are physically new "cards" (with many design improvements/changes made) and they are being sold as what they are - new products. Those are the facts. 

 

Also, AMD has not lied about the 390 series at all. Not once did they claim these were to be brand new GPU cores with a brand new architecture and be much faster than the 290 series. Not once. But they are "new cards" and again, being sold as such for competitive prices relative to the competition. 

 

I really struggle to see why some people are having such a hard time understanding this. 

 

lol they even changed the name from Hawaii to Grenada. It's literally the same chip as the Hawaii core, but they changed the codename. They are being so underhand about this. You can say this is the same as Intel refreshing Haswell and calling it "Haswell Refesh" all you like. One is clearly more honest than the other.

 

Your argument boils down to "well at least they aren't on that old reference card any more" Well thank god! Thank god there are no reference designs this time around because they were abysmal. The 290X reference was not a card that anyone should have ever owned! It was just not up to it in every respect. I mean I've said some things about the Titan X's cooler, but that has nothing on the 290X.

 

The problem with the analysis that they are "much faster" than before is that it doesn't really hold any weight.

 

The 290 could always overclock to the 290X. You could consider it a lower binned version. It wasn't, it had stream processors disabled and such, but the performance difference could be made up. So the 390 performing like a 290X out of the box isn't actually anything special. The 970 at stock matches the 290X, which matches the 290 overclocked which matches the 390 at stock. None of this is particularly surprising, and none of this makes the 390 look like like anything but an overclocked 290 with some RAM thrown on for decoration (because you're never going to use 8GB on that GPU).

 

Sure the 390X matches the 980, but so did the 970 if you overclocked it. So did the 290X if you overclocked it. That's not a particularly difficult feat. So this performance increase you keep talking about just isn't anywhere to be seen. There isn't an awful lot you can do with a 390 that you couldn't do with a 290.

[SkilledRebuilds]

Just sold my un-used Windforce 290 to someone, it's the replacement the RMA team sent me, I tested it, works great, but sold it instead of keeping it, still has warranty and gigabyte said they will honor it if sold too

 

/Guy who bought it said he ......THAT morning, was looking at the 390x, I had him look at some reviews of the Windforce 290 (1040mhz like this one) and then a 390x review.

 

He just saved a couple of hundred dollars for 5-10fps and isn't buying an extra 4Gb Vram he cant use

[bomerr]

There's actually not that much of a gap between the 970 and 980. High overclocking 970's can surpass stock 980's. The big gap is between the 980 and 980Ti.

 

The issue between the 970 and 980 is the price gap. You're paying over $150 more for not a whole lot more performance. The choice is for the individual to decide if that much more performance is worth it and suits their budget. 

 

One thing AMD does well is in exploiting gaps left by others. The 390 goes head to head directly with the 970 and is priced accordingly. The 390x, on the other hand, trades blows with and overall slightly trails the 980. AMD was clever here to price the 390x at $429, undercutting the $499 GTX 980 while delivering nearly the same performance. 

It's about a 18-23% gain going from the 970 to the 980, OC v OC. 

And it's about the same going from the 980 to the 980 Ti. 

So the performance gains between the 970 -> 980 -> 980 Ti actually make quite a bit of sense. 

 

it's just that people that want to pinch pennies will want to go with the lowest option 970 and people that want maximum performance will skip the 980 as even it has problems in 1440p and 4k with games released in the last year.

 

The real problem here is that Nvidia massively underclocked all their Maxwell GPUs so it gives AMD the ability to compare their GPUs to weak stock Maxwells. To recap OCing on Maxwell yeilds about a 20% performance boost so OC the the 980 will dominate the 390X. Thus i don't think the AMD pricing is very good. If i was buying a GPU in that price range (which I am), I would just skip it for the more powerful card. 

[bomerr]

 

Jay's 970 Clockspeeds is quite low actually for a 970. 1200 on a 390 is massive, but 1447 on a 970? That's a bit low for an overclock.

I want to see how the 390 gaming performs against the 970 gaming (both are from MSI and the 970 gaming boosts much higher than EVGA's SSC)

 

good point

My guess is he wanted to keep it somewhat conservative to try and use something he was sure most 970 owners could achieve.

 

Most 970's won't get much past 1500 MHz on air.  So it's really not that low, although some can hit 1600 ish if they're really lucky.

 

hmmm true... though all my friends' 970 can reach +1500 on air

My 980 hits 1530 stable (max is about 1545). It seems like most GM204 chips can hit 1500. 

[MEC-777]

lol they even changed the name from Hawaii to Grenada. It's literally the same chip as the Hawaii core, but they changed the codename. They are being so underhand about this. You can say this is the same as Intel refreshing Haswell and calling it "Haswell Refesh" all you like. One is clearly more honest than the other.

 

Your argument boils down to "well at least they aren't on that old reference card any more" Well thank god! Thank god there are no reference designs this time around because they were abysmal. The 290X reference was not a card that anyone should have ever owned! It was just not up to it in every respect. I mean I've said some things about the Titan X's cooler, but that has nothing on the 290X.

 

The problem with the analysis that they are "much faster" than before is that it doesn't really hold any weight.

 

The 290 could always overclock to the 290X. You could consider it a lower binned version. It wasn't, it had stream processors disabled and such, but the performance difference could be made up. So the 390 performing like a 290X out of the box isn't actually anything special. The 970 at stock matches the 290X, which matches the 290 overclocked which matches the 390 at stock. None of this is particularly surprising, and none of this makes the 390 look like like anything but an overclocked 290 with some RAM thrown on for decoration (because you're never going to use 8GB on that GPU).

 

Sure the 390X matches the 980, but so did the 970 if you overclocked it. So did the 290X if you overclocked it. That's not a particularly difficult feat. So this performance increase you keep talking about just isn't anywhere to be seen. There isn't an awful lot you can do with a 390 that you couldn't do with a 290.

 

Why do you care about the name so much? Who cares that they changed the name from Hawaii to Grenada? Majority of enthusiasts know that Grenada's are simply binned Hawaii's. It's been well-established. 

 

No, that's not what my argument boils down to. And actually, the reference 290's were not bad. The problem was the reference COOLERS, not the cards themselves. Proof: I own a reference PCB-based 290 which I have flashed with a 390x BIOS. Quite a few non-reference 290's cannot handle this BIOS flash because of the lower voltages and higher standard clocks of the 390's due to lower-binned and lower-quality components vs that of the 390's. So the fact that my reference based 290 can handle the BIOS flash proves the reference 290's were not "abysmal" as you claim. Again, it was the reference COOLER that was abysmal. 

 

I never made the analysis that the 390's claimed to be "much faster", so not sure what you're talking about there...

 

Sure, the 390 "looks" like an OC'd 290 with more Vram. Except that it isn't "just" that, and that's my point. An OC'd 290 cannot be OC'd any further. That's it. A 390, on the other hand, can be OC'd further. Jay hit 1200 which is unheard of for most 290's. Also, you may have forgotten, when he tested both cards OC'd, the 390 still traded blows with the 970. The best OC'd 290's can't quite keep up with an OC'd 970. The 390 can. It's not "just an OC'd 290". What things look like and what they actually are, are two different things.

 

I never claimed the performance difference was massive, but there is a difference and it is measurable. Regardless, the 290's are discontinued and won't be around much longer. The 390's are the new products to replace them and AMD has not lied about anything. Your getting caught up in semantics and naming conventions, really. 

 

The real problem here is that Nvidia massively underclocked all their Maxwell GPUs so it gives AMD the ability to compare their GPUs to weak stock Maxwells. To recap OCing on Maxwell yeilds about a 20% performance boost so OC the the 980 will dominate the 390X. Thus i don't think the AMD pricing is very good. If i was buying a GPU in that price range (which I am), I would just skip it for the more powerful card. 

 

Watch Jay's video again. He compares the 390 overclocked to the 970 overclocked and they trade blows. Though I would wager the 390x OC vs 980 OC - the 390x would fall a little further behind. But here's the thing; the 390x is not priced equal to the 980. It's $70 less and sits at a price point where nvidia has nothing to offer. So it all depends on the individual's budget and preferences to decide what's "worth it" for them. If you have $450 to spend on a GPU and not a dollar more, the 980 is out of reach. The 390x, on the other hand, delivers nearly the same performance as the 980 (80-90% OC vs OC) but is more attainable. Their pricing is spot-on, IMO. 

[bomerr]

 

Watch Jay's video again. He compares the 390 overclocked to the 970 overclocked and they trade blows. Though I would wager the 390x OC vs 980 OC - the 390x would fall a little further behind. But here's the thing; the 390x is not priced equal to the 980. It's $70 less and sits at a price point where nvidia has nothing to offer. So it all depends on the individual's budget and preferences to decide what's "worth it" for them. If you have $450 to spend on a GPU and not a dollar more, the 980 if out of reach. The 390x, on the other hand, delivers nearly the same performance as the 980 (80-90% OC vs OC) but is more attainable. Their pricing is spot-on, IMO. 

As pointed out the 970 OC is kinda low. 

 

Also there really isn't a market (anymore) for a 400-500 dollar new GPU. People that want less performance will gravitate toward the 970 (300-400) range and people that want near max performance will go with the $650 980 Ti.  And really savy shoppers will buy use 980s for 400, which is less than the 390X especially cuz it's without tax. 

[othertomperson]

Why do you care about the name so much? Who cares that they changed the name from Hawaii to Grenada? Majority of enthusiasts know that Grenada's are simply binned Hawaii's. It's been well-established. 

 

No, that's not what my argument boils down to. And actually, the reference 290's were not bad. The problem was the reference COOLERS, not the cards themselves. Proof: I own a reference PCB-based 290 which I have flashed with a 390x BIOS. Quite a few non-reference 290's cannot handle this BIOS flash because of the lower voltages and higher standard clocks of the 390's due to lower-binned and lower-quality components vs that of the 390's. So the fact that my reference based 290 can handle the BIOS flash proves the reference 290's were not "abysmal" as you claim. Again, it was the reference COOLER that was abysmal. 

 

I never made the analysis that the 390's claimed to be "much faster", so not sure what you're talking about there...

 

Sure, the 390 "looks" like an OC'd 290 with more Vram. Except that it isn't "just" that, and that's my point. An OC'd 290 cannot be OC'd any further. That's it. A 390, on the other hand, can be OC'd further. Jay hit 1200 which is unheard of for most 290's. Also, you may have forgotten, when he tested both cards OC'd, the 390 still traded blows with the 970. The best OC'd 290's can't quite keep up with an OC'd 970. The 390 can. It's not "just an OC'd 290". What things look like and what they are, are two different things.

 

I never claimed the performance difference was massive, but there is a difference and it is measurable. Regardless, the 290's are discontinued and won't be around much longer. The 390's are the new products to replace them and AMD has not lied about anything. Your getting caught up in semantics and naming conventions, really. 

 

I care about the name because that's all the layperson (and clearly an awful lot of this forum can be counted among that) sees. It absolutely matters if you call something a new product vs a refresh of an existing one. It might be well established, but it doesn't stop this thread from existing, it doesn't stop the numerous people on this forum insisting that the 390 and 390X are new products, that they are good value and that they are much better than the 290 and 290X.

 

He overclcoked his 970 to like 1440 MHz. That's marginally over what mine sits at just with GPU Boost (1320). A 970 with an average overclock (at the very least 1500) will do much better.

[MEC-777]

As pointed out the 970 OC is kinda low. 

 

Also there really isn't a market (anymore) for a 400-500 dollar new GPU. People that want less performance will gravitate toward the 970 (300-400) range and people that want near max performance will go with the $650 980 Ti.  And really savy shoppers will buy use 980s for 400, which is less than the 390X especially cuz it's without tax. 

 

It would be interesting to see what the average max stable OC on 970's are among all users. From what I've heard, you're lucky to hit 1500 on a 970, so something in the 1400's seems pretty good in that regard. But I can grant that may not be the case. Still, at anything 1440p and above, the 390 still made a strong showing, even if that 970 OC was on the low side.

 

People will buy the best they can afford at any price point. The 390x is not meant to stand alone at $429, it's meant undercut the 980. 

[bomerr]

It would be interesting to see what the average max stable OC on 970's are among all users. From what I've heard, you're lucky to hit 1500 on a 970, so something in the 1400's seems pretty good in that regard. But I can grant that may not be the case. Still, at anything 1440p and above, the 390 still made a strong showing, even if that 970 OC was on the low side.

 

People will buy the best they can afford at any price point. The 390x is not meant to stand alone at $429, it's meant undercut the 980. 

It seems like most GM200 chips hit 1450 and most GM204 chips 1500. 

 

And I agree that 390X is better than the 970 because of the VRAM issue. Games like GTA V use over 3.5GB at 1080p. But then again it's 50-70 dollars more so it's not exactly a 970 killer. 

[rentaspoon]

Well the prices where I buy are on par to the 970 and they still required a bigger PSU (that might be AMD playing it safe)

I hate the term rebrand and agree heavily with him

...like is every car line ever a rebrands? no. they refresh car lines every year

Actually you get facelifts, which are the equivalent of rebrands but I don't think its a bad thing, the old graphics cards *look* dated compared to the new cards.

I didn't buy a 290 because it looked dated.

[MEC-777]

I care about the name because that's all the layperson (and clearly an awful lot of this forum can be counted among that) sees. It absolutely matters if you call something a new product vs a refresh of an existing one. It might be well established, but it doesn't stop this thread from existing, it doesn't stop the numerous people on this forum insisting that the 390 and 390X are new products, that they are good value and that they are much better than the 290 and 290X.

 

He overclcoked his 970 to like 1440 MHz. That's marginally over what mine sits at just with GPU Boost (1320). A 970 with an average overclock (at the very least 1500) will do much better.

 

Who ever said they are "much better" than the 290/x? They are "better", that is a fact. But I wouldn't say "much better".

 

I wouldn't call +120mhz "marginal", but fair enough. Closer to 1500 would probably be more representative of the majority of the 970's out there. I can agree with that. 

 

Ok, now, let's look at this from the layperson's perspective; Let's say they have $350 to spend on a new graphics card. Comparing the latest, newest cards available, we're looking at the 390 and 970, both at the same price point. Since they cost the same, what do we look at next? Performance. Which performs better? Overall, they are about the same +/-. After that, people tend to choose which ever looks better. If the person chooses the 390, I fail to see how or where they were lied to or mislead since they are still getting a product that performs according to it's price and value.

[MEC-777]

It seems like most GM200 chips hit 1450 and most GM204 chips 1500. 

 

And I agree that 390X is better than the 970 because of the VRAM issue. Games like GTA V use over 3.5GB at 1080p. But then again it's 50-70 dollars more so it's not exactly a 970 killer. 

 

I don't think you read what I wrote correctly. I wasn't comparing the 390x to the 970. I was comparing the 390x to the 980 and showing how it undercuts the 980 in terms of price by making a card at that level of performance more attainable. 

 

The 390 is what should be compared to the 970 as they cost and perform nearly the same. 

[bomerr]

I don't think you read what I wrote correctly. I wasn't comparing the 390x to the 970. I was comparing the 390x to the 980 and showing how it undercuts the 980 in terms of price by making a card at that level of performance more attainable. 

 

The 390 is what should be compared to the 970 as they cost and perform nearly the same. 

like i said it doesn't really undercut it as the performance is worse. and also that market is pretty small now too cuz like i said most people will skip that price bracket for the next level or go 1 level under. 

[dragosudeki]

I care about the name because that's all the layperson (and clearly an awful lot of this forum can be counted among that) sees. It absolutely matters if you call something a new product vs a refresh of an existing one. It might be well established, but it doesn't stop this thread from existing, it doesn't stop the numerous people on this forum insisting that the 390 and 390X are new products, that they are good value and that they are much better than the 290 and 290X.

 

He overclcoked his 970 to like 1440 MHz. That's marginally over what mine sits at just with GPU Boost (1320). A 970 with an average overclock (at the very least 1500) will do much better.

all the 300 series are new products because you couldn't buy them before. However, the design of it is not completely new, but tell me when a company made a new design from scratch. Every upcoming product will contain aspects from previous products, so no product is new unless it was completely made from scratch. A sequel of a game is new because it just came out, but it still has a lot of features and stuff that is carried over from older games, so it is not new.

 

Price is dependent on where you live. And from what I see, the price of the 390x is around $40-80 above the price of the 290x. I'm not going to talk about sale prices, because all things eventually go on sale and so comparing sale prices is stupid.

 

What makes a card better is the price and performance. As shown performance boost is somewhat marginal, but it is just as marginal as the price. I don't see why it isn't a better card (Probably not exactly much better to others but apparently boosting from 1440MHz to 1500MHz is 'much better' in your opinion, even though arguments have been made saying clock boosts don't make things much better, let alone a 60MHz boost).

[sgloux3470]

The same people that want amd to not keep shitting the bed.

Anyways yes the 390 and lower are imho low end cards. As is the 970. They really shouldn't be used for anything higher than 1080p on their own, which for cp gaming is now the generally the lowest acceptable resolution. Hence low end card. Hell broadwell igpu is basically as good as a 260 so their isn't much room in between.

That's a very skewed perspective.

 

 

They're all very solid 1440p cards too.  They may have to dial down the settings in extreme games, but most games will run very well on them at that res even on ultra.

[ivan134]

 

 

 

That happened back in October when the 970 competed with the 290X for half the price. Like I've already said, the 390 is an overclocked 290 but being sold back at the same MSRP it had nearly two years ago. A two year old product being sold as if it were new is a price rise.

 

 

No, clock for clock they are the same. A 5960X has more cache, more PCIe lanes, can address more RAM, uses DDR4 and it has more cores and hyperthreading but it's still essentially Haswell. It still has basically the same IPC. None of the things that make it a better and more expensive CPU have any impact on gaming performance.

 

 

 

Good. I don't have time for you going so far out of your way to defend these business practices. In the end the consumer loses out from AMD lying like this.

 

I said I'm done because you have no idea what the fuck you're talking about. The 290 launched at $399 and the 390 with 4 GB more VRAM launched at $329. Where the fuck is the price hike?

[Doobeedoo]

Yeah, seeing benchmarks out there and I also wouldn't say it's a rebrand but rather refresh. Though it doesn't matter, performance and price is what matters and flagship cards are another story so there's that.

[Techhog]

lol they even changed the name from Hawaii to Grenada. It's literally the same chip as the Hawaii core, but they changed the codename. They are being so underhand about this. You can say this is the same as Intel refreshing Haswell and calling it "Haswell Refesh" all you like. One is clearly more honest than the other.

 

Your argument boils down to "well at least they aren't on that old reference card any more" Well thank god! Thank god there are no reference designs this time around because they were abysmal. The 290X reference was not a card that anyone should have ever owned! It was just not up to it in every respect. I mean I've said some things about the Titan X's cooler, but that has nothing on the 290X.

 

The problem with the analysis that they are "much faster" than before is that it doesn't really hold any weight.

 

The 290 could always overclock to the 290X. You could consider it a lower binned version. It wasn't, it had stream processors disabled and such, but the performance difference could be made up. So the 390 performing like a 290X out of the box isn't actually anything special. The 970 at stock matches the 290X, which matches the 290 overclocked which matches the 390 at stock. None of this is particularly surprising, and none of this makes the 390 look like like anything but an overclocked 290 with some RAM thrown on for decoration (because you're never going to use 8GB on that GPU).

 

Sure the 390X matches the 980, but so did the 970 if you overclocked it. So did the 290X if you overclocked it. That's not a particularly difficult feat. So this performance increase you keep talking about just isn't anywhere to be seen. There isn't an awful lot you can do with a 390 that you couldn't do with a 290.

I just want to get some clarification here: Your argument is that it doesn't matter if it's a rebrand or a refresh, since AMD is attempting to deceive customers, correct?

[Catman007]

To me, and probably rest of the sane gaming population, benchmarks are holy grail when it comes to gaming. And we all saw 200 and 300 series comparison. Like some guys said couple of posts earlier : Sponsors