RX 490 Is it worth waiting for?

[BiggusDickus]

Hey guys! So here is my dilemma: I bought a Razer Blade Stealth a while ago and now I'm getting ready to buy the core. As I want it to be cheap the new red team's RX series got my attention. (A 200$ graphics card that is better than a gtx 970???) But the thing is I want a bit more power than a RX 480 but I don't want it to be as expensive as a gtx 1070 or 1080. And then there is one more thing, I'll be travelling to the US in November and that's when I will be able to buy the core and GPU by a much cheaper price tag. Now I'm thinking if I should wait for the RX 490. Will it be released until November? Does the "90" make it much more expensive according to the other generations or will the price drop on this one? How good will it be? And more importantly: is it worth the waiting and uncertainty? 

[Shubham Yadav]

There is nothing like free meal. If the RX 490 performs on par with the GTX 1070, they will price it accordingly. If they price it below, expect Nvidia to follow suit and drop the price of 1070.

 

It's always worth waiting. in terms of price/performance. But you can't wait forever. Please don't ask these questions as they are impossible to answer.

[BiggusDickus]

2 minutes ago, Shubham Yadav said:

There is nothing like free meal. If the RX 490 performs on par with the GTX 1070, they will price it accordingly. If they price it below, expect Nvidia to follow suit and drop the price of 1070.

 

It's always worth waiting. in terms of price/performance. But you can't wait forever. Please don't ask these questions as they are impossible to answer.

I don't think I made myself clear enough. What I wanted to know were rumors, any possible lead on what will the 490 be. I want to know what level will it be. I've searched it and all I found was a website saying that it might be as powerful as a 1080. And that's why I posted it. Not to have as an answer "It's always worth waiting" but to gather leads on the rx 490.

[SteveGrabowski0]

I don't think Vega is supposed to release until Q2 2017. I could be wrong, but I could swear I saw it confirmed by AMD as a Q2 release somewhere.

[Shubham Yadav]

14 minutes ago, BiggusDickus said:

I don't think I made myself clear enough. What I wanted to know were rumors, any possible lead on what will the 490 be. I want to know what level will it be. I've searched it and all I found was a website saying that it might be as powerful as a 1080. And that's why I posted it. Not to have as an answer "It's always worth waiting" but to gather leads on the rx 490.

It won't be as powerful as the 1080 if history is any indication. It should be slightly more powerful than the 1070 like the 390 was to the 970.

 

And no, there have been no leaks so far. Because it probably isn't even in production. I expect the release of vega around the same time zen launches, which is when I'll be making my rig.

[GiSWiG]

Not in a rush? Then wait. My thoughts are that the RX 490 will be close to the 1080 but cost near the 1070. If AMD markets two RX 480s to be faster than a single 1080 then they need to have a single card to directly compete with the 1080 at around the same price. At that point, I expect nVidia to drop the price of the 1070 and 1080 where the 1070 would be cheaper on average than the 490 but the 1080 now looks worth spending the extra money for. The 1080 Ti will most likely be out.

 

Again, not in a rush, wait. The 490/Vega will have more hardware features that AMD might have green-team fanboys jealous, secretly of course. They won't admit that the red-team will have the upper hand.

[SteveGrabowski0]

Throw him to the floor

[BiggusDickus]

6 hours ago, GiSWiG said:

Not in a rush? Then wait. My thoughts are that the RX 490 will be close to the 1080 but cost near the 1070. If AMD markets two RX 480s to be faster than a single 1080 then they need to have a single card to directly compete with the 1080 at around the same price. At that point, I expect nVidia to drop the price of the 1070 and 1080 where the 1070 would be cheaper on average than the 490 but the 1080 now looks worth spending the extra money for. The 1080 Ti will most likely be out.

 

Again, not in a rush, wait. The 490/Vega will have more hardware features that AMD might have green-team fanboys jealous, secretly of course. They won't admit that the red-team will have the upper hand.

THANK YOU! Now that's what I needed. And I guess I'll wait 'till Novembers first week and then start thinking with the money I'll have there. But thank you for your point of view.

[ivan134]

Alright guys, time to dust off the crystal ball

[Heavygun1450]

The alleged RX 490 isn't going to be releasing anytime soon IMO... Its probably going to be Vega architecture. And I bet you it wont be more powerful than a 1070 by a long shot.

[BiggusDickus]

5 minutes ago, ivan134 said:

Alright guys, time to dust off the crystal ball

LOL, that's what I need right now.

[Nena Trinity]

Hold on wont there be a Vega 10 & 11? o3o (I expect one to be a 1070 competitor and one to be for 1080...)

[rattacko123]

AMD had a leak on their site that said that the 490 will be available before christmas. There was also a leak saying it had >256-bit bus. Thats pretty much it

EDIT: just buy whatever is available when you buy the core

[rattacko123]

2 hours ago, Heavygun1450 said:

The alleged RX 490 isn't going to be releasing anytime soon IMO... Its probably going to be Vega architecture. And I bet you it wont be more powerful than a 1070 by a long shot.

It will be better than the 1070 if they release a 200W+ version (considering the rx 480 is 150W), it just needs to be at least as powerful as r9 fury to compete.

I reckon that the 490 will probably be similar to the r9 fury X in terms of performance but it wont have HBM, it will most likely release at the end of Q4 2016 or Q1 2017. The RX fury (or whatever it will be called) will definitely surpass the 1070 (maybe even 1080 levels of performance) and have HBM, and may release Q1/Q2 2017

[Zangashtu]

18 hours ago, SteveGrabowski0 said:

Throw him to the floor

Do what sir?

[GiSWiG]

11 hours ago, Nena360 said:

Hold on wont there be a Vega 10 & 11? o3o (I expect one to be a 1070 competitor and one to be for 1080...)

Yes, but if it follows what AMD did with the Polaris series, Vega 10 will be for the mainstream desktop and Vega 11 for the mobile. I don't think that AMD will be able to get full-fleged desktop GPUs in laptops like nvidia did but competitive Vega 11's in gaming laptops could be an option.

 

My thoughts is that the 490 will be competing against the 1070, just as the 390 competed against the GTX970 but AMD's 490 has to be faster than the 1070, it just has to if AMD wants to be a considereation for mid-high range gamers . I said before that a 490 might be closer to the 1080. I'm wondering if the 490 will be closer to the 1070 but still faster for a cheaper price with a possible 490X beating out a 1080. $450ish for a 490 that beats out a 1070 would be a great spot ($400 for reference, average $450 for AIB). Any lower and you start to make the people who went with dual 480s upset and possibly those who went a single 480.

[Nena Trinity]

18 minutes ago, GiSWiG said:

Yes, but if it follows what AMD did with the Polaris series, Vega 10 will be for the mainstream desktop and Vega 11 for the mobile. I don't think that AMD will be able to get full-fleged desktop GPUs in laptops like nvidia did but competitive Vega 11's in gaming laptops could be an option.

 

My thoughts is that the 490 will be competing against the 1070, just as the 390 competed against the GTX970 but AMD's 490 has to be faster than the 1070, it just has to if AMD wants to be a considereation for mid-high range gamers . I said before that a 490 might be closer to the 1080. I'm wondering if the 490 will be closer to the 1070 but still faster for a cheaper price with a possible 490X beating out a 1080. $450ish for a 490 that beats out a 1070 would be a great spot ($400 for reference, average $450 for AIB). Any lower and you start to make the people who went with dual 480s upset and possibly those who went a single 480.

So there will be no 490 and Fury II?

[MEC-777]

11 hours ago, rattacko123 said:

 just buy whatever is available when you buy the core

This. Just buy what ever best suits your budget at the time, unless you know there is something new coming very soon (within a couple months) and you don't mind waiting a little longer. 

 

Otherwise, by the time you wait for this "new GPU" in 6-8 months, there will be another "new GPU" just around the corner and you'll wonder if you should wait for that as well. With that mentality, you will always be waiting. 

 

Another option, and this is usually what I do; buy a high-end card from the previous generation when the new generation cards are released. The previous cards get crazy price cuts and you can get some killer deals on perhaps a better card than you originally planned.

 

Also, from what I understand, AMD is not going after the top performance slot for GPUs anymore (at least not for a while). Intsead they are focusing on the low to mid-range GPUs which is the vast majority of GPU purchases ($150-$300 range). AMD is working on CPUs, APUs and GPUs. Knowing they are financially limited compared to Nvidia and Intel, they cannot afford to develop all products across all price points. They are focusing their resources on where it matters most. If they are successful, will we see another top-spot GPU contender from AMD again, I don't doubt. 

[GiSWiG]

On 9/11/2016 at 11:26 PM, BiggusDickus said:

Hey guys! So here is my dilemma: I bought a Razer Blade Stealth a while ago and now I'm getting ready to buy the core. As I want it to be cheap the new red team's RX series got my attention. (A 200$ graphics card that is better than a gtx 970???) But the thing is I want a bit more power than a RX 480 but I don't want it to be as expensive as a gtx 1070 or 1080. And then there is one more thing, I'll be travelling to the US in November and that's when I will be able to buy the core and GPU by a much cheaper price tag. Now I'm thinking if I should wait for the RX 490. Will it be released until November? Does the "90" make it much more expensive according to the other generations or will the price drop on this one? How good will it be? And more importantly: is it worth the waiting and uncertainty? 

So back to your main question...

 

As far as timing and the RX 490, you won't see that anytime near November or any where near $200 so your choices are probably the 480 or the 1060. It looks like you want decent power but not spend a lot. $200 USD would be hard to hit if your thinking of at least the RX 480/GTX 1060 level so I would say 1060 or 480 at around $300 USD, but they might be closer to $270 in November. I almost got a 1060 but thanks to the people here and me having an ultrawide Freesync monitor, I went with the RX 480. I just ordered it so it should be here in two days.

 

So where do you plan on buying the card? At my local Best Buy I've actually seen the RX 470, 480, 1060, 1070 and 1080, on the shelf for a while now, even while almost all online stores, including Best Buy's, are out of stock. The problem is that the 1070 and 1080 have been Founder's Editions, the 1060 might have been an EVGA AIB but the RX series were XFX. XFX is a good brand but there are better ones. My Best Buy is also not in a major city but it is not a smaller store either. You might have better luck at a suburb store rather than an in-city store. 

 

There is Microcenter which supposedly has better options but because of that, their stock might be slim. I've never been in a Microcenter so maybe someone here can give a better idea on what you would find there. Its might be a good thing that I don't live near a Microcenter as I would probably be divorced :-).

 

If any one disagrees, I'd go this route:

1060 if using a non-G-Sync or non-FreeSync monitor

1060 for G-Sync

RX 480 for FreeSync

 

Now the future is a bit fuzzy. If a lot of the new games coming out support Vulkan then the RX480 is the winner. If mostly DX12, then it is more of a tie. If you want to play mostly recent DX11 titles, then 1060. I'm not sure how much a-sync computing will be utilized in the near future but AMD would be the way to go.

 

Either way, get either the 6GB 1060 or the 8GB RX480 and not the 3GB or 4GB respectively.

 

You did not mention anything about the monitor you'll be using. What resolution do you plan on playing at and do you have G-Sync, FreeSync or neither?

[Delicieuxz]

Here's my speculation on the RX 490:

On 25/08/2016 at 0:11 AM, Delicieuxz said:

 

 

This image is official, from AMD. Take note of the specific type of games which qualify each tier of card as being fit for its respective marketed resolution: DOTA 2, LoL, etc.

 

AMD lists the RX 470 and RX 480 as being 1440p cards, in games such as DOTA 2 and LoL. AMD uses the same standard of DOTA 2 and LoL to call the RX 490 (which is the upcoming Vega card) as a 4K card.

 

The RX 470 and RX 480 cards are obviously not 1440p cards for general gaming, and also require toning down graphics settings in many games at 1080p. Since the RX 490 is being measured by the same qualification as those cards, it's already predictable right now that the RX 490 will at best be a decent 1440p card, though it will likely still require graphics settings to be toned down in 1440p in many games, just as is the case with the RX 470 and RX 480 in many games at 1080p.

 

Also, AMD has said that they didn't invest much effort into researching big GPU advancements in the past many years, because they expected high-performance gaming to phase out, which is why the RX 480 was so underwhelming. Well, Vega was designed with the same mindset, and Vega's design was finalized around the time that the GTX 1070 and 1080 released, and so there wasn't time for AMD to revise Vega to suit the reality of the GPU market that Nvidia has made fully clear.

 

Taking all these things into account, I expect that the Vega-based RX 490, the so-called 4K GPU, will be a bit less powerful than a GTX 1070 in DX11 applications, and perhaps a bit more powerful than a GTX 1070 in async-compute applications... but that it will still be less powerful than a GTX 1080. I think the RX 490 will deliver about the same gaming performance at 1440p as the RX 480 does at 1080p.

[i_build_nanosuits]

Can't even remember the last time any AMD GPU was worth waiting for..

[Heavygun1450]

AMD's GPU's have usually never exceeded performance of Nvida. They where either the same performance or it was a bit less performance compared to Nvidia. AMD cannot compete with Nvida's 1080 period.

[SkilledRebuilds]

36 minutes ago, i_build_nanosuits said:

Can't even remember the last time any AMD GPU was worth waiting for..

Mine was a 5850>7950 upgrade...before that...way way way before that... the Beastly ATI 9800PRO (When 16-24x+ shader pipelines were baws)

The Nano,(on paper)... had promise,... but I felt let down.

IMO - Overclockers Dream.. Fury/X was a joke of a card. (Powerful yes, but not enough)

My HD7950 is powering my HTPC, I'll give it kudo's, I do love the 7900 series topend & OC potentials.

[i_build_nanosuits]

5 minutes ago, SkilledRebuilds said:

Mine was a 5850>7950 upgrade...before that...way way way before that... the Beastly ATI 9800PRO (When 16-24x+ shader pipelines were baws)

The Nano,(on paper)... had promise,... but I felt let down.

IMO - Overclockers Dream.. Fury/X was a joke of a card. (Powerful yes, but not enough)

My HD7950 is powering my HTPC, I'll give it kudo's, I do love the 7900 series topend & OC potentials.

HD5850/5870 and HD7950/7970 were brilliant at the time of release and cheaper than nvidia equivalents indeed...been downhill since then for AMD though.

[SkilledRebuilds]

Just now, i_build_nanosuits said:

HD5850/5870 and HD7950/7970 were brilliant at the time of release and cheaper than nvidia equivalents indeed...been downhill since then for AMD though.

I was lucky then.

I do recall a literal 2x boost to a lot of games... 5850>7950 + OC had me surpassing double the performance.

If the 5850 had more vram I'd have kept it for longer...

 

IMO - There warrants a need to have a bigger card than the RX480 (RX485 @ 2560 shaders), make it power hungrier (cos who cares that much if it performs right?) and unlock that performance we want!