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[Various] AMD R9 285 reviews

22K views 283 replies 86 participants last post by  zerowalker 
#1 ·
Quote:
Ever since AMD launched the Hawaii family of GPUs (R9 290 and R9 290X) the company has maintained a bifurcated structure. Certain features, like TrueAudio and the new superior XDMA engine for Crossfire support have been present on some GPU models but not on others. Today, AMD is launching a new 28nm GPU (codenamed Tonga) and formally known as the R9 285. This new card takes Hawaii's superior feature set and brings it down to the $250 price point - but then layers on new features of its own. Unofficially, Tonga appears to be the debut of the GCN 1.2 architecture.


 
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#2 ·
Pass & some of those reviews are really really bad.
 
#5 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by Capt View Post

Most reviewing sites have become lazy and just do the bare minimum when reviewing hardware.
I've noticed. ever since the DC launch earlier this year it's like people are rushing their reviews out. though I can understand the lack of enthusiasm for this product, still want them to be thorough.
 
#6 ·
This is what Tahiti should have been when against GK104. It is restricted by the slow 5500 memory, if it has 6Ghz- 7Ghz GDDR5 it will be quite a bit faster.

Whats wrong with AMD using 5500 memory in 2014?
doh.gif
 
#7 ·
Based on the reviews, AMD named this card wrong. R9 285 implies its better than the R9 280, and in some cases it is but in other cases it's not. It doesn't consistently beat the R9 280, at least not yet. AMD should have gone with some impressive clockspeeds (1ghz+) to counter that significant bus width reduction.

AMD probably should have named this card the R9 275X and priced it accordingly.
 
#8 ·
There has to be an 285x. That is the only way this product makes sense to me. Die size is larger than I thought.... slightly smaller than Tahiti. This must also means that AMD isn't moving to 20nm till at least Mid-2015 (for GPUs at least).
Quote:
Originally Posted by BinaryDemon View Post

AMD probably should have named this card the R9 275X and priced it accordingly.
That is probably why they didn't. lol
 
#9 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by BinaryDemon View Post

Based on the reviews, AMD named this card wrong. R9 285 implies its better than the R9 280, and in some cases it is but in other cases it's not. It doesn't consistently beat the R9 280, at least not yet. AMD should have gone with some impressive clockspeeds (1ghz+) to counter that significant bus width reduction.

AMD probably should have named this card the R9 275X and priced it accordingly.
exactly. or better still, this should have released a year ago as the 270X instead of just renaming the existing stack. but either way, this gpu should be no more than $200, and even that's a stretch for tahiti pro performance in late 2014.
 
#10 ·
Their naming scheme is awful now. For example, the R9 270 and 270x, people think the 270 is a 7850 but the 7850 is actually the R7 265. Now this 285 which is not as good as a 280. It has more stream processors than the 7870XT card which had a silly name too since it crossfired with the 7950 and not the 7870 and looking back on it, it makes more sense than this new naming scheme.

I could figure out better naming for their GPU's in about 20 minutes.

AMD, call me...
 
#11 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by iRUSH View Post

Their naming scheme is awful now. For example, the R9 270 and 270x, people think the 270 is a 7850 but the 7850 is actually the R7 265. Now this 285 which is not as good as a 280. It has more stream processors than the 7870XT card which had a silly name too since it crossfired with the 7950 and not the 7870 and looking back on it, it makes more sense than this new naming scheme.

I could figure out better naming for their GPU's in about 20 minutes.

AMD, call me...
well....Nvidia is a mess too lol I have no idea why arent both of them do as good as Intel
 
#12 ·
Most of the reviews are awful... And how they can be so inconsistent with the power consumption results?

Probably i will trust toms power consumption test more
 
#14 ·
I assume this card still lacks HDMI 2.0? I can't find anything that mentions HDMI 2.0 support.

Meh... as I expected, this card isn't faster than the 280x in most cases which is rather disappointing, don't know why AMD came up with such a poor naming scheme for this card and I didn't really see the purpose of this card either.
 
#15 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by Chrono Detector View Post

I assume this card still lacks HDMI 2.0? I can't find anything that mentions HDMI 2.0 support.

Meh... as I expected, this card isn't faster than the 280x in most cases which is rather disappointing, don't know why AMD came up with such a poor naming scheme for this card and I didn't really see the purpose of this card either.
280 and 280x is going eol
 
#16 ·
Not much to write home about the 285, but I guess it is an ok refresh for the old 7950/280 that was lacking new features. What's more interesting is to see what the full Tonga chip is about. Apparently it's almost the same size as Tahiti so I'm guessing it'll have the 384-bit bus intact. I suppose it'll fit nicely in between the 280X and 290. They do have to work on the power efficiency though.
 
#17 ·
Wasnt this card supposed to have really good perf/watt? Tpu and guru3d seem to suggest the complete opposite...

not as efficient as maxwell was quite clear but this almost feels like there's something wrong with the card or the reviews...
 
#18 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by Alatar View Post

Wasnt this card supposed to have really good perf/watt? Tpu and guru3d seem to suggest the complete opposite...

not as efficient as maxwell was quite clear but this almost feels like there's something wrong with the card or the reviews...
on 3dguru is at 188 watt? Yeah agree that is something wrong with the power consumption
 
#22 ·
After waiting to replace my broken GPU for this release as I was going to buy the R9 280. I have just ordered the R9 280 as the R9 285 is £20+ more in the UK with roughly the same performance and a few extra features users of the price range I doubt would use... I was expecting more
 
#23 ·
I don't understand what AMD is trying to do here. This card is a slap in the face of current consumers. It reduces vram and bandwidth, and provides very little performance increase over the R9 280. What is the point of this card?
 
#24 ·
After reading some reviews and thinking about it some more (wrote the last reply and looked at the graphs in a bus) I still can't figure out how AMD managed to get this card to consume so much power.

They cut the bus width, implemented the same improvements as in the 7790/260X and hawaii cards (and some extras), and used a really mature process. And then we end up with this:

http://tpucdn.com/reviews/Sapphire/R9_285_Dual-X_OC/images/perfwatt_2560.gif

A reference maxwell card literally has twice the performance per watt.
 
#26 ·
I understand that this card was meant to run on a node lower than what it is currently running on. I think it would make sense in that guise, as they could probably push clock speeds and keep power consumption in check. I get that.

However, with Nvidia's Maxwell architecture having even better power efficiency than Kepler on the same 28nm node, Nvidia seems to be on the right track. AMD... I think they need to get a little more creative with their design if they expect to remain competitive.
 
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