ASUS Radeon R9 280X DirectCU II TOP Video Card Review

System Overview & Testing Procedures
Like any graphics card you just slide it into an open PCI-Express slot, connect your power and you are good to go.

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This is the system we will be using to test the ASUS Radeon R9 280X DirectCU II TOP.

Processor: Intel Core i7-4960X Extreme Edition
Motherboard: ASUS P9X79 Pro
Video Card: ASUS Radeon R9 280X DirectCU II TOP
Memory: 16GB Kingston 10th Anniversary
Power: Cooler Master V850
Storage: 750GB SATA Drive
Cooling: be quiet! Shadow Rock 2
Case: Cooler Master Cosmos II with 5 fans

As always we’re first going to verify our numbers and make sure we’re accurately reporting the performance specification of the card. Here’s a GPU-Z screenshot, listing all the information. The card is running with an overclock of of 1000 MHz. The memory also has an overclock up to 6400 MHz from the reference 6000 MHz.

info

For our tests we will be comparing the Gigabyte Radeon R9 280X OC to a few other graphics cards we have on hand. They are listed below along with their core, boost and memory speeds

ASUS R9 280X DirectCU II TOP: 970 MHz / 1070 MHz / 6400 MHz
EVGA GTX 680: 1006 MHz / 1058 MHz / 6000 MHz
Gigabyte R9 280X OC: 1000 MHz / 1100 MHz / 6000 MHz
MSI GTX 770 Gaming: 1059 MHz / 1111 MHz / 7010 MHz
Sapphire HD 7950 Vapor-X: 850 MHz / 950 MHz / 5000 MHz
Sapphire R9 280X Toxic: 1100 MHz / 1150 MHz / 6400 MHz

Benchmarking Information
When we cover graphics cards, we always run the same benchmarking suites and then a selection of the most popular and hardware intensive games available. I have separated our tests into 2 different sections (Benchmarks & Games) and you can see them listed below.

Benchmarks
3DMark – Fire Strike
3DMark 11
Heaven Benchmark

Games
Alien vs Predator
Battlefield 4
Sleeping Dogs
Max Payne 3

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