Leaked Images of the AMD R9 390X Vid Card

[MrRiplEy[H]]

The 390 series is essentially a rebranded 290 series. They upped the ram performance a bit but thats it.

Tests show that the 8Gb ram is useless unless you crossfire, a single GPU configuration doesn't have the oomph required to utilize anything past 4Gb with playable framerates.

The architecture is exactly the same as the previous 290 series. The new wide memory bandwith models are still in the future.

[Gman]

I saw that on the WanShow from LinusTech today, that the 390 is basically the same as the previous version with some driver updates is all.  The Fury and Fiji, still have to wait and see if the new memory type/etc is any better than nVidia.  Some stuff out there from those who are testing them saying the 650$ AMD card will be much faster than the 980ti and Titan, but I'll believe it when I see it.

[Masherbrum]

Exactly Gman.   All of this window dressing is for naught and am looking at upgrading my 780ti to a 980ti or ti Hybrid. 

[Gman]

Several tech sites put up reviews through the night showing the performance of the Fury X.  The 980ti handily beats it in most benchmarks and games tested, and the 980ti also doesn't need an external fan/liquid radiator setup.  So much for the superiority of the new "high bandwidth memory" AMD has been working on for 7 years.  I thought their 650$ Fury X was going to be a surprise for nVidia, and start the GPU wars up again.  Who knows, maybe the Fiji will do so next month, but considering the $/performance value I'm seeing with the Fury X, and it being a bit of a letdown, I'm not optimistic that AMD is going to snatch any titles from nVidia back anytime soon.

Maybe I'm wrong, and Fiji will be a Titan/ti killer, but I wouldn't be betting any money on it after the Fury X results.

[MrRiplEy[H]]

Several tech sites put up reviews through the night showing the performance of the Fury X.  The 980ti handily beats it in most benchmarks and games tested, and the 980ti also doesn't need an external fan/liquid radiator setup.  So much for the superiority of the new "high bandwidth memory" AMD has been working on for 7 years.  I thought their 650$ Fury X was going to be a surprise for nVidia, and start the GPU wars up again.  Who knows, maybe the Fiji will do so next month, but considering the $/performance value I'm seeing with the Fury X, and it being a bit of a letdown, I'm not optimistic that AMD is going to snatch any titles from nVidia back anytime soon.

Maybe I'm wrong, and Fiji will be a Titan/ti killer, but I wouldn't be betting any money on it after the Fury X results.

Furys problem is not the memory bahdwith. It has only 4Gb of vram because the first generation HBM can't handle more, combined to a slow GPU. Once the tech picks off the current cards will be left in the dust.

[Skuzzy]

The performance does not surprise me at all.  The can throw 100GB of memory at it and it is not going to make any difference at less than 4K resolutions where most people are today and where the 980Ti ate the R9's lunch.

The HBM memory is doing about what I would expect, in the real world.

[Gman]

It's really a shame AMD can't come up with something better than this.  I remember when I was building my first x79 system in mid/late 2012, and Skuzzy you were putting together a new system around that time, and put in I believe it was a 7950GPU from AMD.  I recall having a very tough time deciding on either an nVidia 680, which was the fastest GPU out then, or a few various AMD cards like the 7970 or 7950, which had equal or even better $/performance ratios as nVidia.

It's all gone to crap for them now it seems though, as even with these new offerings that have been so anticipated, have fallen flat on their faces really. 

Very disappointed tbh.

[BoilerDown]

AMD's Fury X is the same price as the 980Ti, but with worse performance.  And no HDMI 2.0 support (since that was previously mentioned as someone's anticipated feature).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1l-Wl4_rSII#t=4

It would be fine if AMD priced it lower than Nvidia.  Right now AMD is just taking people's money before the inevitable price drop.  It won't take them long at all, they gotta drop the price by $50 or $100 or once the pre-order crazies are done, or else there will be no one else lined up to buy these. 

Or maybe they are gambling that another bitcoin phenomenon is going to happen in their favor.  I'm having trouble making sense of AMD's pricing here otherwise.

[MrRiplEy[H]]

The performance does not surprise me at all.  The can throw 100GB of memory at it and it is not going to make any difference at less than 4K resolutions where most people are today and where the 980Ti ate the R9's lunch.

The HBM memory is doing about what I would expect, in the real world.

As mentioned the current generation of HBM memory is severely limited by the 4Gb max addressing issue. The tech industry has high hopes for the HBM future generations. Nvidia is going to implement it too on future cards.

[Skuzzy]

As mentioned the current generation of HBM memory is severely limited by the 4Gb max addressing issue. The tech industry has high hopes for the HBM future generations. Nvidia is going to implement it too on future cards.

Yes NVidia is going to go with HBM memory as it uses less power.  It is a no-brainer for that alone and for its densities.  However, it does not matter what the address size limitations are, the performance is not going to change in any user measurable manner.

AMD really screwed up by over-hyping the performance potential of HBM memory.  Sure, there is one case where there is an extreme benefit, but unfortunately, that one case will never be seen in the real world.

[MrRiplEy[H]]

Yes NVidia is going to go with HBM memory as it uses less power.  It is a no-brainer for that alone and for its densities.  However, it does not matter what the address size limitations are, the performance is not going to change in any user measurable manner.

AMD really screwed up by over-hyping the performance potential of HBM memory.  Sure, there is one case where there is an extreme benefit, but unfortunately, that one case will never be seen in the real world.

So what you're saying is that it makes no difference if you have 4Gb vs 8Gb on 4k resolutions? Or how does it not 'change performance'? Of course having only 4Gb addressable is a huge disadvantage. Once the tech matures and they go higher the old technology will be sitting in the dust.

[Skuzzy]

So what you're saying is that it makes no difference if you have 4Gb vs 8Gb on 4k resolutions? Or how does it not 'change performance'? Of course having only 4Gb addressable is a huge disadvantage. Once the tech matures and they go higher the old technology will be sitting in the dust.

No, I did not say any such thing.  Allow me to highlight what I said.

The performance does not surprise me at all.  They can throw 100GB of memory at it and it is not going to make any difference at less than 4K resolutions where most people are today and where the 980Ti ate the R9's lunch.

The HBM memory is doing about what I would expect, in the real world.

The cards performance was poorer at HD resolutions than the NVidia card.  It remains to be seen what additional memory will do for UHD performance, as it will depend on the application being used.  To suggest it would be better or worse is simply speculation, at this point.

However, AMD again screwed up their marketing by insisting this card is best at UHD.  If they really believe that, then why bother with only 4GB of RAM when it needs more than that to realize its full potential at UHD resolutions?  The contradiction is rather blatant.

They would have been better off waiting until they could populate the card with 6GB of RAM, or more, before claiming the performance is best at UHD resolutions.

At this point, it is not much more than an embarrassment for AMD.

[Gman]

At this point, it is not much more than an embarrassment for AMD.

Pretty much how every tech/gaming site/channel is coming down as well.

I'll admit, their marketing and hype got me interested in trying their new Fury X/Fiji cards in my upcoming Skylake builds, but for reasons as stated in the last few posts, I lost any gumption I had on risking a switch from nVidia.  I'm sure they lost a lot of potential customers with this recent endeavor, which IMO was nearing a bait and switch sort of deal.  Maybe that's a little too harsh, but still, it's pretty disappointing to see these new cards and options from AMD fall on their face like this. 

Looks like staying with nVidia for a few more years is going to be very likely, if it isn't broke, don't fix it I suppose.  Again though, I was truly hoping for performance that beat the 980ti handily, and with the Fiji beat the Titan - I'd have bought at least 3 cards shortly, maybe more from AMD had they not screwed this all up.

[Skuzzy]

The sad thing is, the Fiji is not a bad card.

Two things:

1)  It needs to be about $100.00 U.S. less than the 980Ti.  Given it has 2GB less RAM and is slower than the 980Ti that would be about the right price point.

2)  AMD should not have raised expectations with the marketing campaign they did.

Those two things would have made this a much better launch.

[Gman]

Yep, agree.