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SAPPHIRE RX 480 NITRO NOW AVAILABLE FOR PRE-ORDER AT OVERCLOCKERS UK (WORLD FIRST) !!!

fuzzylogic said:
I've just ordered one, am I going to be waiting years for it? :D

Also I have this case, is the cooler going to ok or should I have gone for the blower-style reference cards?

https://www.overclockers.co.uk/aerocool-qs-202-midi-tower-case-black-ca-029-ae.html
Click to expand...

Well I got one in the fractal core 500
https://www.overclockers.co.uk/fractal-design-core-500-mini-itx-cube-case-black-ca-066-fd.html
It doesn't seem to be too bad. Only seems to get loud under sustained 100% load.

I'd say you'll be fine, you'll have more airflow then I do :p
 
Steampunk said:
I think there will be a lot of people who don't realise how much larger the Powercolor card is. It's 310mm long, and would be even longer if they hadn't moved the power socket from the end to the front of the card. It will fit in my Antec 302 (the longer, wider version of the 300 case) with all of 8mm to spare.

OCUK doesn't seem to list the dimensions, I went to the Powercolour site, but OCUK should really note how long this card is if they don't want to be getting a load back because they just won't fit. The Nitro is fully 70mm shorter, which is likely going to make a massive difference in how many cases it will fit into.
Click to expand...

Exactly, it's a darn long card, and even then it has heatsink overhang from the extra long PCB.

It reminds me of my 390X Nitro card where I had to move an HDD sled away to make the card fit; and even then I had to slide the GPU in backside first.

I don't see the Devil as an issue there, but I'm more concerned about the backplate; similar to how the reviewer couldn't fit the card into PCIe-Slot 1.

I noticed from the photos on Guru3D that they had to use the second slot as well. Depending on Motherboard and CPU that second slot can be anything from x8 or x4 speeds.

I know that on my x99 deluxe the second slot is a physical x4 slot, and the one below that is a x1, unless I set the motherboard into 3Way SLI mode; in which case it's x8.

I had a gander at the motherboard Guru3d used as well, and they had the Devil inside a x8 PCIe slot as well.

I'm not sure how much of a difference in performance current cards make for x16 vs x8 speeds.

So I really hope the Devil can fit in my top slot; it looks like it might, but you never know with such a long card and backplate.
 
Freddie1980 said:
Do you have a Nitro drunkmaster?
Click to expand...

I switched the order to the Powercolor when I saw the pictures showing the overhanging fan and showing the narrow heatsink. It instantly made me think that it basically wasn't a good enough design. I prefer a card with bigger fans compared to smaller fans, but the heatsink needs to match the shape/size of the fan otherwise extra airflow isn't being used. It just looked like a poor design. I'm completely agnostic on looks in terms of I buy what performs. I personally think the Powercolor looks messy and a bit daft but it performs how it performs.

The length of the Powercolor put me off a bit, not because it will be a problem in my case(figuratively or literally), I do think a 30CM long card in a midrange card is a difficult sell for second hand thinking about selling in a years time or whenever.

I'm entirely not at all surprised that it turns out the Nitro is 10dba louder at all. It's also only got 2 heatpipes, much of the airflow is wasted, there is no reason for the pcb to be so wide and area available is higher than people think. Spec wise the Devil specs say it's 8mm wider... despite the top being in line with the top of the bracket while the Sapphire clearly extends 2-3cm past the pci-e bracket height. My real issue is they've put in a pcb extension bit, made the shroud significantly wider and used absolutely none of that extra width to put in a wider heatsink. If the existing pcb/shroud used a 40% wider heatsink cooling would be excellent. As it stands they've made the card about 20-30% larger than it needs to be, they could shrink the width, the shroud and not change the pcb or heatsink at all.
 
Steampunk said:
I think there will be a lot of people who don't realise how much larger the Powercolor card is. It's 310mm long, and would be even longer if they hadn't moved the power socket from the end to the front of the card. It will fit in my Antec 302 (the longer, wider version of the 300 case) with all of 8mm to spare.

OCUK doesn't seem to list the dimensions, I went to the Powercolour site, but OCUK should really note how long this card is if they don't want to be getting a load back because they just won't fit. The Nitro is fully 70mm shorter, which is likely going to make a massive difference in how many cases it will fit into.
Click to expand...

Trying to get actual specs on the card is a nightmare, look up the Nitro listed specs on Sapphires site and the Devil's dimensions, it's ludicrous. The sapphire says it's 120mm wide, the Powercolour 128mm, when the Sapphire clearly is a much wider card as it extends beyond the pci-e bracket where the Powercolor doesn't, well it does but is broadly speaking in line with it. They are the actual pcb size specs I would say... which unless you're selling a bare pcb with no heatsink has exactly no relevance to the end user. Not listing the actual dimensions of the card, pcb, heatsink shroud and all is insane.

Width isn't much of a problem in the massive majority of cases though some it will be, wish more cards were insanely wide and had 120mm fans on them, they'd fit in most cases and reduce length with is an issue in far more cases than the width is. So much wasted/dead space between side panel and gpu.
 
Enjoying tweaking mine

Running heaven getting sore around 1340

No oc yet trying to undervolt and get the fan acoustics right

Looking at fan rpm of 1900. - 2000 to keep it under 85c

State 7 voltage is 1115

Power limit is 25%

Giz
 
I reached 1400/2200 with a FS graphics score of 14,659 :)

That's an 8% performance increase from stock OC Nitro clocks.

Here are my test runs and final FS score:

N7kNGu.jpg


Gvb6Wv.jpg
I haven't tried to push it further and probably wont, happy with this result.
Some strange things I noticed. During the demo run through before the tests start the temperature always rises to max with fan speeds steady at about 2000rpm even if max fan is 2300rpm. Then when tests start temperature drops to ~75 yet fan speed rises to max after the temp has dropped.
So I changed fan to 2000 which stopped this happening and it didn't effect temps. I'm not sure why max temp dropped while I was increasing the mem clock, although I did open a window late last night which might have brought room temp down, and carried on the tests in the morning.
Some odd scores near the bottom like a higher score when all I did was lower fan speed, I gave up on tweaking soon after as was getting confused!
Out of the box the GPU clock of 1342 does fluctuate quite badly, everyone needs to raise the power limit to stop this. That's pretty poor if you ask me, maybe they did it to keep the power under 150W?
 
Last edited:
GizF1 said:
Enjoying tweaking mine

Running heaven getting sore around 1340

No oc yet trying to undervolt and get the fan acoustics right

Looking at fan rpm of 1900. - 2000 to keep it under 85c

State 7 voltage is 1115

Power limit is 25%

Giz
Click to expand...

No disrespect to you, I'm aiming the following comments at the card :) That is disappointing to see temperatures like that with no OC. The score is about the same as an R9 290, so that's pretty good.
 
Egg90 said:
I
Some strange things I noticed. During the demo run through before the tests start the temperature always rises to max with fan speeds steady at about 2000rpm even if max fan is 2300rpm. Then when tests start temperature drops to ~75 yet fan speed rises to max after the temp has dropped.
So I changed fan to 2000 which stopped this happening and it didn't effect temps. I'm not sure why max temp dropped while I was increasing the mem clock, although I did open a window late last night which might have brought room temp down, and carried on the tests in the morning.
Click to expand...
I am quiet sure that there are some anomaly in driver or in Wattman. Yesterday I tried some OC, vent profile, etc...
At stock speed (1342) with +25% powet limit and increased vent. speed the cooler could not cool the GPU down under 81-82 Celsius at 60% vent. It was very loud for me so I changed the vent. profile back to default... And the temperature went back to 77 Celsius at ~50% vent.... Strange.
Also I got 75 Celsius at 1385/2200 + 25% power limit during Fire Strike while I got 78 Celsius at default clocks... I dont get it. Right now I consider Wattman as "not usable".
 
Almost all Nitro reviews say that there were issues with the target temperatures and mad fans. But apparently some have got it working so no idea.

They should hurry and beta launch the Trixx or something.
 
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