290 or 390x

dnic77 · 8 Dec 2015 at 20:23

Ok so i i have a msi 290 overclocked to 1100. But its struggling with assassin's creed syndicate and the fans are driving me mad. Would upgrading to 390x be much of a jump in performance? Im gaming at 1080p and have no plans on upgrading the monitor yet.

Phixsator · 8 Dec 2015 at 20:27

Counting on that you would overclock the 390x as well i would say around 11-15% performance gain over your current 290 would be my guess.

TonyTurbo78 · 8 Dec 2015 at 20:27

No I wouldn't personally. While the 390x would definitely be better than your card, I don't think it's worth the extra money going from a 290.

jimhaumman · 8 Dec 2015 at 20:29

No worth it,wait till next year.

sneakysnail · 8 Dec 2015 at 21:00

You could potentially sell you 290x for £200ish and get a 390 for £250-300. all depends on model of course but could work out, If not interested in the hassle I'd just get an aftermarket cooler. find it hard to believe that it's struggling to get 60 FPS in AC though, is it throttling under load from the heat?

new boy · 8 Dec 2015 at 21:00

Is there ANY difference between a 290/390 and 290x and 390x?

Apart from 8gb Vram (which some 290* had anyway) and hynix vram (which early/good 290* had anyway)?

dnic77 · 8 Dec 2015 at 21:08

Its a msi 290 gaming. Once overclocked it gets as high as 90 degrees with 100% fan. Its not getting 60fps its more in the 40s on high settings. Id sell the 290 to fund the 390x so it should cost around £150.

sneakysnail · 8 Dec 2015 at 21:10

new boy said:
Is there ANY difference between a 290/390 and 290x and 390x?

Apart from 8gb Vram (which some 290* had anyway) and hynix vram (which early/good 290* had anyway)?

you mean just the card and not the coolers? nothing really, although they do draw slightly less power

dnic77 said:
Its a msi 290 gaming. Once overclocked it gets as high as 90 degrees with 100% fan. Its not getting 60fps its more in the 40s on high settings. Id sell the 290 to fund the 390x so it should cost around £150.

I wouldn't bother with a 390x TBH, the performance increase compared to the price increase is pretty poor. A 390 still performs at the level of a 290x. Do have to wonder about your temps though, have poor case airflow? Might want to consider applying some new paste perhaps? I assumed you were running with a reference cooler, the Msi coolers not a bad cooler so surprised the temps are so high.

new boy · 8 Dec 2015 at 22:11

sneakysnail said:
you mean just the card and not the coolers? nothing really, although they do draw slightly less power

how do they draw less power considering nothing has changed?

arc@css · 8 Dec 2015 at 22:45

At best, around 20% difference. Unless you find one for a very good price, I wouldn't bother.

TonyTurbo78 · 8 Dec 2015 at 22:48

new boy said:
Is there ANY difference between a 290/390 and 290x and 390x?

Apart from 8gb Vram (which some 290* had anyway) and hynix vram (which early/good 290* had anyway)?

build quality on the 390 series is much better, stronger braces and better VRM cooling. Apart from that, not much difference, obviously the 8GB VRAM as you've already noted.

LtMatt · 9 Dec 2015 at 08:01

Don't swap a 290X for a 390. A 390X would make a little more sense if you can get a good price for the 290X which would offset some of the cost. The 390X will run a little bit faster 5% or so, but you should find it cooled much better so noise and temperatures will no longer be an issue.

Have you considered going for a Fury or a Fury X? The Fury x will offer around a 30-40% boost over the 290X and a Fury will offer around a 20-30% boost over the 290X, depending on the resolution/settings used. Either of these would be a more worthwhile upgrade than a 390X.

arc@css · 9 Dec 2015 at 09:47

AMDMatt said:
Don't swap a 290X for a 390.

It would be a move from a 290 to a 390X, but still not worth it unless a great deal came along.

coupe69 · 9 Dec 2015 at 10:02

sneakysnail said:
You could potentially sell you 290x for £200ish and get a 390 for £250-300. all depends on model of course but could work out, If not interested in the hassle I'd just get an aftermarket cooler. find it hard to believe that it's struggling to get 60 FPS in AC though, is it throttling under load from the heat?

Unless I'm reading the op wrong he has a 290 not a 290x. Unfortunately 290's and even 290x's don't fetch anywhere near £200. I've seen 290's go for as little as £100 in the mm!

Marine-RX179 · 9 Dec 2015 at 10:09

Honestly a 290 shouldn't "struggle" with Assassin's Creed games, and if it does, it is either just good old Ubisoft being good old Ubisoft, or there are Nvidia/GameWorks features enabled that are killing the performance- try disabling them where possible.

Avenged7Fold · 9 Dec 2015 at 10:14

^

If the 290 isnt cutting it then the 390x wont.

Be selective with 1 or 2 settings and you will be fine

Davedree · 9 Dec 2015 at 10:56

AMDMatt said:
Don't swap a 290X for a 390. A 390X would make a little more sense if you can get a good price for the 290X which would offset some of the cost. The 390X will run a little bit faster 5% or so, but you should find it cooled much better so noise and temperatures will no longer be an issue.

Have you considered going for a Fury or a Fury X? The Fury x will offer around a 30-40% boost over the 290X and a Fury will offer around a 20-30% boost over the 290X, depending on the resolution/settings used. Either of these would be a more worthwhile upgrade than a 390X.

At 1080p fury-x is sometimes barely an upgrade over a 390x. Stock for stock abd depending on game the fury x will only be 0-10%/15% over a 390x/290x.
At 1440p then fury scales better but still coming from a 290 hardly worth the effort considering the spec of the fury. People need to remember amd tried to do the dirty by reviews showing the 390/x with higher clocks and better drivers against throttling 290/290x's without the driver that gave the 390 the 10% gain. Therefore we see a lot of people stating the 390 is just as fast as the 290x, when actually if they are both run at the same clocks using the same drivers the 290x will be the same as the 390x.

I'd have a look at the tim on that msi 290 unless you are running crazy volts it shouldn't be hitting 90c.
Either way a 390/390x is not worth it like peeps above say, the only worthy jump at 1080p is the 980ti.
I'd try and sort your current card out rather than spend money for a sidegrade.

sneakysnail · 9 Dec 2015 at 13:14

coupe69 said:
Unless I'm reading the op wrong he has a 290 not a 290x. Unfortunately 290's and even 290x's don't fetch anywhere near £200. I've seen 290's go for as little as £100 in the mm!

In the mm sure but on auction sites they go for 200+ all the time, even refrence cooler version. And yeah i missread thonking he had a 290x

dnic77 · 10 Dec 2015 at 17:19

Ok so after reading all these comments i decided not to go for a 390x. Ive sold 290 on a auction site and ordered a 980ti this morning. So that should a nice upgrade. As for the other questions on the 290, it had been repasted with liquid pro and the volts were +100 in ab to get a stable 1100mhz.

Davedree · 10 Dec 2015 at 17:37

dnic77 said:
Ok so after reading all these comments i decided not to go for a 390x. Ive sold 290 on a auction site and ordered a 980ti this morning. So that should a nice upgrade. As for the other questions on the 290, it had been repasted with liquid pro and the volts were +100 in ab to get a stable 1100mhz.

Suprised by the temps but hey ho, enjoy that 980ti at 1080p it's going to be amazing.