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Gallery GTX670 TriSLi to R9 290 xfire watercooled

ontariotl

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Joined
Oct 3, 2008
Messages
249
Location
London
As the old saying goes "out with the old, in with the new" time again. The damn upgrade bug bit me hard and I went back to Red camp again. I probably could have waited for Maxwell, but thats another 6 months at least. Given the value of what AMD came out with, it was hard to pass up. Yes, the 780Ti is king for single GPU again, but I'm not only getting one, I'm getting two!

And since 3 complaints that are against the R9 290 with heat, noise, and power, I can rectify 2 of those issues. As for power, I have enough and I don't really worry about electricity bills.

They finally arrived today!


Hard to find these suckers now. I made sure I could get these with the cards or it was no deal to upgrade


Neat looking cooler, but does it ever suck. I think its a melted down HD5870 shroud and fan which would explain things


Time to start strippin!


No more nickel plated for this guy. Learned my lesson no matter how much they tell me they fixed the issue.



Ready to go


One down, One to go.


Both done and ready for install


Time to disconnect the tubes from the rads, and pull the case out to remove the GTX670's



My external cooling setup, makes it nice and quiet since it lined out the other side of the room.


Bye bye, you have served me well :thumb:



R9 290's installed


Had to use black sleeved 8 pin connectors as I only had blue 6 pin


All in its glowing glory


So far with the little time I have had with these cards have impressed me beyond my expectations. I really walk on pins and needles with AMD drivers as I suffered the dreaded grey screen of death on the HD5800 series line, cold bug on the HD5970 and thats when I went back to Green. Not to say green didn't have their own issues with drivers from time to time, it was never as bad as AMD.
Again I am impressed with the beta drivers so far and look forward to maybe more performance in the coming months. I have seen a few having issues with drivers and black screen on BF4 but so far I have been lucky.
I'm just starting to stretch its legs with overclocking and I maybe near the limit, but until Afterburner comes out with a new (or is it out already?) version to have full support for the 290 series.
I have so far reached 1.1Ghz (from 947Mhz) GPU and 3000Mhz (from 2500Mhz) Mem stable from my testing. Now keep this in mind that this is without throttling like it does on air.

Noise - 0db
Temps - default Idle 30c
Load 37c

1100/1300 Idle 31c
Load 42c

AMD what where you thinking with this OEM cooling?
 
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ontariotl

Well-known member
Joined
Oct 3, 2008
Messages
249
Location
London
Reserved for benchmarks. more to come later in the morning

Time to compare Tri-SLi and xfire. Have to justify my purchase :whistle:

Some specs before going on.

Asus Z77 WS
3770k delided and running at 4.8Ghz
16GB G.skill 2400Mhz DDR3
Raid 0 SSD x 240Gb
Seasonic X1250W Power supply

Evga GTX670 FTW 2GB Tri SLi running at (1267Mhz,1287Mhz, and 1306Mhz GPU/3300Mhz Memory)
Xfx R9 290 xfire (default 947Mhz GPU/2500Mhz Memory)(overclocked 1100Mhz GPU/3000Mhz Memory)

Valley Benchmark (All settings max, excl AA. 5760x1200)

Evga GTX670 FTW 2GB Tri SLi


Xfx R9 290 xfire (default)


Xfx R9 290 xfire (overclocked)


Heaven Benchmark (all settings max, excl AA. 5760x1200)


Evga GTX670 FTW 2GB Tri SLi


Xfx R9 290 xfire (default)


Xfx R9 290 xfire (overclocked)



Rest of the benchmarking without fancy screenshots

Crysis Dx10 All Very high settings x86 gpu benchmark (no AA) 5760x1200

Evga GTX670 FTW 2GB Tri SLi Min. fps 11.63 Max. fps 84.56 Avg. fps 61.43

Xfx R9 290 xfire (default) Min.fps 25.86 Max. fps 83.37 Avg. fps 60.13

Xfx R9 290 xfire (overclocked) Min.fps 48.37 Max.fps 101.84 Avg. fps 71.54



Tomb Raider Max settings incl. Tress FX hair (no AA) 5760x1200

Evga GTX670 FTW 2GB Tri SLi Min. fps 1.8 Max. fps 62.1 Avg. fps 29.8

Xfx R9 290 xfire (default) Min.fps 3.0 Max. fps 73.9 Avg. fps 59.3

Xfx R9 290 xfire (overclocked) Min.fps 3.0 Max.fps 80 Avg. fps 66.3


Battlefield 4 Ultra settings Single Player(no AA) 5760x1200

Evga GTX670 FTW 2GB Tri SLi Min. fps 3 Max. fps 97 Avg. fps 48.196

Xfx R9 290 xfire (default) Min.fps 46 Max. fps 102 Avg. fps 65.79

Xfx R9 290 xfire (overclocked) Min.fps 49 Max.fps 103 Avg. fps 71.15
 
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IRQ Conflict

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Joined
Mar 27, 2009
Messages
1,806
Location
Drayton Valley, AB
Oh! This is really good! Thanks for taking the time! Do you have to run some sort of uber pumps when you have such long reaches with the hose?
 

ontariotl

Well-known member
Joined
Oct 3, 2008
Messages
249
Location
London
Oh! This is really good! Thanks for taking the time! Do you have to run some sort of uber pumps when you have such long reaches with the hose?

I have 2 swiftech 655 pumps running intake on one end and outlet on the other end of the rads. It had enough pressure to get through 3 gpu waterblocks and a cpu and probably could do more if needed.
 

clshades

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Joined
May 18, 2011
Messages
6,250
Location
Big White Ski Resort
I think those pumps have around 19 feet of head each... so ya if you are running two in series that's a lotta pumping power. Good idea running them in a different room too.:thumb:
 

Sagath

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Folding Team
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Feb 7, 2009
Messages
6,635
Location
Edmonton, AB
Nice dude. I'm really impressed by the min FPS jump, even with the loss of 'max' fps. I sense a 670 might be up for sale soon? ;)
 

ontariotl

Well-known member
Joined
Oct 3, 2008
Messages
249
Location
London
Nice dude. I'm really impressed by the min FPS jump, even with the loss of 'max' fps. I sense a 670 might be up for sale soon? ;)

Yup, just posted it now after cleaning them up and putting the air coolers which have never been used back on.:thumb:
 

hitek

Well-known member
Joined
Mar 15, 2009
Messages
48
Location
Kitchener, Ontario
Nice setup,
And here I am getting excited about picking myself up a 2nd GTX 670 2GB this week for SLI. :p

I love the remote radiators, one of my favorite setups was when I was able to run my DVI, USB, and other assorted cables through the wall and have my computer sitting in the adjoining room.

Got all that noise and heat out of my room and let me run the fans turned up 24/7. :D
 

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