Official OcUK RX480 4GB and 8GB review thread

[ICDP]

I'm really disappointed to see so many AMD apologists who were expressly expecting more not say a bad word about this and just spend all their time defending it.

I get that you dont want your favored brand to take a hit and of course there's the 'well if Nvidia have it all their way' arguments, but it all still strikes me as quite dishonest.

The card is disappointing. Not bad at all, just disappointing given the expectations and circumstances. I also get that there's probably a reasonable amount of unjustified negativity, but still. Seems like that is just giving some an excuse to find positives to point out.

You answered your own question in one post. A lot of the AMD apologists are out defending RX 480 because so many hyperbolic posts are declaring it a total failure at every level. Declaring 480 = 970 while conveniently ignoring or downright lying about the following.

1. Comparing 4GB 970 to 8GB 480 rather than the 4GB 480 and proclaiming same price and same performance.
2. Ignoring that in DX12 RX 480 is 25%+ faster than 970.
3. Declaring DX12 irrelevant anyway, while also conveniently forgetting RX 480 matches or slightly beats 970 in DX11.

http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/foru...9-radeon-rx480-8gb-performance-review-24.html

Considering the 20%+ difference in price it is fair to break RX 480 into two separate entities, the 4GB and the 8GB.

4GB for me is/was an epic little GPU at £175 giving superior performance and far superior price to 970, while being a far more future proofed and forward looking GPU (DX12). The only issue is AMD idiotically declaring it EOL, which is absolutely pathetic IMHO. Here is a GPU that would give them immense market share and they EOL it after one day. Hopefully one or more of the AIBs kick some sense into AMD.

IMHO The 8GB card here in UK is a failure due to pricing. I know this is because of the value of the pound since last year but R9 390 custom AIBs have been available since release from around £230+. So yeah 8GB RX 480 at £220 is a fail because it's actually slower than R9 390 in both DX11 and DX12. The only reason to pick 8GB 480 is because R9 390 stock runs out soon. DP 1.4, HDMI 2.0 and HDR monitor support are nice but not make or break on a mainstream GPU.

 

[Willis]

So I i've come into the review thread and all I see is 3 pages of people spouting the same old carp that should be in the 'Radeon RX 480 "Polaris" Launched at $199' thread.

Can we not just keep this to reviews of the card and not people spouting who is correct about the pre release of this card.

 

[Owenb]

Worrying times for AMD.

From a consumer point of view it is a good card - good bang for buck.
However the architecture is crap and AMD will be stuck with low margin chips for years to come. Low margins leads to low R&D and the gap between red and green will continue to grow.
Using back of an envelope calculations Vega won't be fast enough to compete with the 1080 let alone the 1080Ti and will consume 50%+ more power and generate 50%+ more heat.

 

[sanaxe1]

There seems to be confirmed reports of the 480 failing PCI express power requirements.

https://m.reddit.com/r/Amd/comments/4qfwd4/rx480_fails_pcie_specification/?utm_source=mweb_redirect&compact=true

 

[Seanspeed]

You haven't debunked anything, all you have done is talk down to me with your usual condescending crap.

When Polaris was first talked about, long before AMD did their announcement, people were expecting it to be a high end mid range card. That's the facts. But, even after the announcement that Polaris 10 were 380 replacements people still expected a card that would beat the 980. And the hype rose and rose until people were comparing it to 980ti and maybe overclocking to 1070 speeds. Gibbo had to come in and stop that train of thought.

Then suddenly this card was crap because it was only coming in at 970 performance levels. You youself said that you were expecting the card at stock to be faster than the 980.

And now the card is released it's a failure because it isn't what you wanted to be. People still clung to the belief, right up to the final reviews that it was going to be faster than a 980. Heck if you look through the threads some people still expected 980ti performance and were disappointed because of that.

My point still stands, people with 970's and 390's on these forums were hoping that they could change to Polaris when it came out. This didn't change even though AMD said this was a 380x replacement. So their disappointment is more from where they were hoping the card would perform.

I've explained many times why it was entirely reasonable to have the expectations I did. 1.5x node jump, new architecture, 5.8TF, etc and it should have easily been able to at least MATCH the next tier up's full fat card(390x).

In fact, this was the *general* expectation of many/most before the leaks started painting a lesser picture. Then lots of people were assuring themselves it was just because of dodgy drivers and whatnot.

Only now are some people backpedaling and trying to say these people were being unreasonable or unrealistic when we had every reason to have the expectations we did. And we have every reason to say it is disappointing for not meeting those realistic expectations.

 

[ICDP]

Worrying times for AMD.

From a consumer point of view it is a good card - good bang for buck.
However the architecture is crap and AMD will be stuck with low margin chips for years to come. Low margins leads to low R&D and the gap between red and green will continue to grow.
Using back of an envelope calculations Vega won't be fast enough to compete with the 1080 let alone the 1080Ti and will consume 50%+ more power and generate 50%+ more heat.

I'm not sure where the Polaris architecture is crap comes from and also Vega is a different architecture, hence the different name. Polaris 11 and RX 470 (P10) are still to come and should by all accounts show much better power usage.

 

[Toss3]

This.
Even I am surprised at initial sales, we've now passed 1000, because this card is a totally amazing upgrade for 80% of gaming market and even better future proof due to its excellent DX12 performance and 8GB of VRAM.

It's not just that - it's the only card that doesn't cost ~£400+ that comes with newer technologies. Pretty sure a lot of people are buying them to hold them over until Vega/1080 Ti launches and we'll see cheaper 14/16nm mid/high-end parts.

 

[FoxEye]

4GB for me is/was an epic little GPU at £175 giving superior performance and far superior price to 970, while being a far more future proofed and forward looking GPU (DX12). The only issue is AMD idiotically declaring it EOL, which is absolutely pathetic IMHO. Here is a GPU that would give them immense market share and they EOL it after one day. Hopefully one or more of the AIBs kick some sense into AMD.

IMHO The 8GB card here in UK is a failure due to pricing. I know this is because of the value of the pound since last year but R9 390 custom AIBs have been available since release from around £230+. So yeah 8GB RX 480 at £220 is a fail because it's actually slower than R9 390 in both DX11 and DX12. The only reason to pick 8GB 480 is because R9 390 stock runs out soon. DP 1.4, HDMI 2.0 and HDR monitor support are nice but not make or break on a mainstream GPU.

Pretty balanced post; I can't disagree.

My nephew phoned me yesterday as he wants to build himself his first PC, and was looking forward to the 480 release.

I told him pretty much as you say. The 4GB is a good card for £175, but the 8GB is not worth the money. He knows I'm also after a new card and asked what I'm doing. Of course I'm waiting for the 1060 to see how it compares, but I told him the choice of waiting or not is his, and the 4gb 480 is a good buy today.

The fact that AMD have already discontinued the 4gb means in a month or so you will only be able to recommend the 8gb.

And for me, like you said, the 8gb 480 is a card that's very hard to recommend. It will win by default when you can no longer buy a 390. But until then? Hard to fall in love with the 8gb at its current pricing.

 

[PhoenixUK]

Alright guys, I officially announce that the 1060 will be 980ti performance for £250 and will OC to 1070 levels and run super quiet at 100 TDP. nVidia don't you dare release anything else otherwise we'll put you to shame and never buy any of your products again.

 

[Nasher]

There seems to be confirmed reports of the 480 failing PCI express power requirements.

https://m.reddit.com/r/Amd/comments/4qfwd4/rx480_fails_pcie_specification/?utm_source=mweb_redirect&compact=true

That is very bad if it's true. Expect broken motherboards :/

 

[DHR]

Have the option of picking up an 8GB card for 1080p gaming today for £199.... getting tempted.

 

[PhoenixUK]

Where? Know you can't link but trust?

 

[DHR]

Where? Know you can't link but trust?

Seen too many people get banned this last 48 hours! Not getting involved. It looks like the 4gb stock has dried up elsewhere though.

Anyone that owns one, hows the fan noise?

 

[Tommy_Here]

Don't know if posted already but here is a crossfire review
https://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/AMD/RX_480_CrossFire/21.html

lets look at it grabbing up a pair of 8gb as those were used in the test at the cheapest price at overclockers we're looking at £440 now it handily beats a 980 Ti in games that scale well yes, BUT the Ti was running stock now if we add a 20-25% performance boost on the 980 Ti that'll become very close to the performance of them scaling perfectly, or it'll beat them where it scales on average and for games that don't scale it annihilate them. so for a £359.99 980 Ti to cost around £60 less you're getting a card that can match them or beat them, less power, less issues I don't see why you'd buy 2 of these upfront if I'm honest

 

[Catanonia]

Don't know if posted already but here is a crossfire review
https://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/AMD/RX_480_CrossFire/21.html

lets look at it grabbing up a pair of 8gb as those were used in the test at the cheapest price at overclockers we're looking at £440 now it handily beats a 980 Ti in games that scale well yes, BUT the Ti was running stock now if we add a 20-25% performance boost on the 980 Ti that'll become very close to the performance of them scaling perfectly, or it'll beat them where it scales on average and for games that don't scale it annihilate them. so for a £359.99 980 Ti to cost around £60 less you're getting a card that can match them or beat them, less power, less issues I don't see why you'd buy 2 of these upfront if I'm honest

As expected with xFire.

 

[Killer7xx]

Apparently some have been able to clock the card to over 1400MHz by strapping a custom cooler or waterblock to it. However the card is power limited by the single 6 pin, seems like the reference model is just too basic for any real overclocking.

 

[pete910]

Most wont be interested in this but one for us Linux users

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=amdgpu-rx480-linux&num=1

Seems AMD has improved somewhat with the drivers both open and closed.

 

[N19h7m4r3]

Apparently some have been able to clock the card to over 1400MHz by strapping a custom cooler or waterblock to it. However the card is power limited by the single 6 pin, seems like the reference model is just too basic for any real overclocking.

There reference was designed primarily to be as cheap as possible while not suffering the same power and heat issues as Hawaii did.

Aftermarket cards are really going to be ones to look for if you want to do anything more than just plug it and and get on with it.

I'm sure Sapphire will have a nice beefy cooler and better power delivery system as usual; only concern there is the costs increasing; which erodes the Price to Performance. So we just need to hope the AIB's come with some decent out of box clocks to counter that.

 

[Greebo]

This.
Even I am surprised at initial sales, we've now passed 1000, because this card is a totally amazing upgrade for 80% of gaming market and even better future proof due to its excellent DX12 performance and 8GB of VRAM.

So as I predicted it sold more cards in one day than the 1080 sold in a week?

SOld as in sold and dispatched

 

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Most wont be interested in this but one for us Linux users

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=amdgpu-rx480-linux&num=1

Seems AMD has improved somewhat with the drivers both open and closed.

Good spot!!