HoTWiReZ's DoMaiN

[News BoT]

<p align="center"></p><p><p>
After initially missing their planned availability window of late February, AMD sends word this evening that the first Radeon R7 265 SKUs have finally reached North American retailers.</p>
<p>
Sapphire&rsquo;s R7 265 Dual-X, which we reviewed back on February 13^th, is the first SKU to hit Newegg. This is a reference clocked model with 2GB of VRAM, utilizing Sapphire&rsquo;s tried-and-true Dual-X cooler.</p>
<table align="center" border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="1" width="575">
<tbody>
<tr class="tgrey">
<td align="center" colspan="7">
AMD GPU Specification Comparison</td>
</tr>
<tr class="tlblue">
<td width="120">
&nbsp;</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle" width="85">
AMD Radeon R9 270</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle" width="85">
AMD Radeon R7 265</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle" width="85">
AMD Radeon R7 260X</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle" width="85">
AMD Radeon R7 260</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="tlgrey">
Stream Processors</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
1280</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
1024</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
896</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
768</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="tlgrey">
Texture Units</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
80</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
64</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
56</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
48</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="tlgrey">
ROPs</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
32</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
32</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
16</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
16</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="tlgrey">
Core Clock</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
900MHz</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
900MHz</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
N/A</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
N/A</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="tlgrey">
Boost Clock</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
925MHz</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
925MHz</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
1100MHz</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
1000MHz</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="tlgrey">
Memory Clock</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
5.6GHz GDDR5</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
5.6GHz GDDR5</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
6.5GHz GDDR5</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
6GHz GDDR5</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="tlgrey">
Memory Bus Width</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
256-bit</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
256-bit</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
128-bit</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
128-bit</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="tlgrey">
VRAM</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
2GB</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
2GB</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
2GB</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
1GB</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="tlgrey">
FP64</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
1/16</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
1/16</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
1/16</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
1/16</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="tlgrey">
TrueAudio</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
N</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
N</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
Y</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
Y</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="tlgrey">
Transistor Count</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
2.8B</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
2.8B</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
2.08B</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
2.08B</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="tlgrey">
Typical Board Power</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
150W</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
150W</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
115W</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
95W</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="tlgrey">
Manufacturing Process</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
TSMC 28nm</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
TSMC 28nm</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
TSMC 28nm</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
TSMC 28nm</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="tlgrey">
Architecture</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
GCN 1.0</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
GCN 1.0</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
GCN 1.1</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
GCN 1.1</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="tlgrey">
GPU</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
Pitcairn</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
Pitcairn</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
Bonaire</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
Bonaire</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="tlgrey">
Launch Date</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
11/13/13</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
03/05/14</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
10/11/13</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
01/14/14</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="tlgrey">
Launch Price</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
$179</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
$149</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
$139</td>
<td align="center" valign="middle">
$109</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p>
Meanwhile, to our amazement the card is listed at $149 &ndash; AMD&rsquo;s MSRP &ndash; rather than retailing at a higher price. Between bitcoin miners and the tendency for recently launched products to retail $10 or so above MSRP, we weren&rsquo;t expecting to see 265 hit shelves at MSRP for any period of time, so this comes as a pleasant surprise. Though we&rsquo;ll still be keeping an eye on prices since it remains to be seen whether these prices will hold.</p>
<p>
With this launch AMD&rsquo;s counter to NVIDIA&rsquo;s recently launched GeForce GTX 750 Ti is finally on the market. As we saw in our review of that card, AMD and NVIDIA have taken widely divergent paths at $149, so each product will have its strengths and weaknesses. The R7 265 cannot match the GTX 750 Ti&rsquo;s sub-75W power usage (or overall power efficiency), but it does offer better performance, beating the GTX 750 Ti by around 19%.</p>
</p>

Read more...

Source: AnandTech
This channel features the latest computer hardware related articles.