AMD Radeon R9 380 review: The best $200 graphics card you can buy for 1080p gaming - juarezroake1984

The battle for PC gaming's sweet spot is on.

The $150 to $200 price range is crucial for AMD, Nvidia, and every of their various partners. The overwhelming majority of graphics cards oversubscribed cost to a lesser degree $200, with cards in that price range delivering a massive 1080p experience in ultramodern games—and over 50 percent off each Personal computer gamers rock 720p or 1080p displays, according to the Steam hardware survey. Mainstream graphics cards are a full-grown deal.

Cause in point: Just last calendar month, Nvidia released a new GeForce GTX 950 nontextual matter identity card ready to snatch the $150 crown away from AMD's Radeon R7 370. That prompted AMD to release a more powerful R9 370X in around parts of the earthly concern.

The tables turn when you hit the $200 mark. First revealed at E3, the Radeon R9 380's "Tonga" graphics processor is the same one found in the R9 285, which first launched in August 2022. But don't let the rehashed GPU deter you: The Radeon R9 380 is loaded with support for AMD's newest features and delivers the best raw performance you can find for $200 nowadays, surpassing Nvidia's $200 GeForce GTX 960—albeit at the expense of much high power utilization.

VisionTek's Radeon R9 380 backplate.

Meet the newfound mainstream 1080p champion. Let's entrench.

Inside the Radeon R9 380

You won't find much new inside the R9 380 that wasn't already available in the R9 285. Glancing over the spec sheet to a lower place, the lonesome noticeable difference betwixt the two is that the scoop clock pep pill was nudged up from 918MHz in the R9 285 to 970MHz in the "new" R9 380. The retentivity speed also received a delimitation-negligible 100MHz bump.

Technical school specs for the total Radeon R300 serial family.

Because of that, we won't spend much clip detailing the Radeon R9 380's deepest, darkest details—just check the chart in a higher place if you're interested. It's easy in models with 2GB or 4GB of memory, and since the Tonga GPU is still comparatively rising—Aug 2022 wasn't that lang syne—the R9 380 packs full stick out for DirectX 12 and helpful AMD features like FreeSync, Realistic Super Resolution, and Frame in Order Target Control, unlike the $150-and-up Radeon R7 370, which is based on a GPU from 2012.

The VisionTek Radeon R9 380's port selection.

VisionTek kindly transmitted U.S.A ane of its 2GB R9 380s for examination, and you couldn't ask for a advisable representative. The VisionTek Radeon R9 380 sticks to stock glasses from clock speeds to memory configuration, but spruces things up with a Nice dual-fan custom cooling solution featuring a card-length heat sink and pig heat pipes. Those hot up sink fins run across the distance of the card to help vent heat out of the rear many well, a design feature that AMD itself recently crowed about when introducing the Radeon R9 Nano.

A fixed, lightlessness metal backplate—shown supra, in the intro—is another nice touch, American Samoa is VisionTek's small-scale lifetime warranty on the card if you register it inside 30 days of buy out. That drops to one year if you don't register. The killer warrant and thoughtful human body quality isn't free, however, arsenic VisionTek charges $230 for this particular card.

Connectivity-informed, the VisionTek Radeon R9 380 offers DVI-D, DVI-I, HDMI 1.4a, and DisplayPort, the last of which is a must-have if you're thinking of investing in a FreeSync monitor to make your PC games super-smooth.

AMD Radeon R9 380 bench mark tests

American Samoa ever, we reliable the VisionTek Radeon R9 380 connected PCWorld's dedicated graphics card benchmark system. Here are the relevant tidbits:

• Intel's Core i7-5960X with a Barbary pirate Hydro Serial H100i closed-loop weewe cooler, to eliminate whatever potential for CPU bottlenecks affecting graphical benchmarks
• An Asus X99 Deluxe motherboard
• Corsair's Vengeance LPX DDR4 memory, Obsidian 750D full tower cause, and 1200-W AX1200i power supply
• A 480GB Intel 730 series SSD
• Windows 8.1 Pro. The testbed hasn't been upgraded to Windows 10 yet.

Our DIY build guide for the simple machine has every nitty-gritty detail about it if you'rhenium thirsting for even more detail.

Next page: Gaming benchmarks begin.

We retested different additional graphics cards to receive a sense for the Radeon R9 380's treasure, including Nvidia's competing $160 GeForce GTX 950 and $200 GeForce GTX 960, with both existence EVGA Super Superclocked models. Read: not tired, though we besides downclocked the GTX 950 to reference ignoble time speeds to represent very roughly sprout performance for that lineup. Note that doing so doesn't provide a exact simulation of the stock GTX 950's behavior, however, due to the way Nvidia's GPU boost works.

We also tossed in an older VisionTek R9 270X. Ideally, information technology would've been nice to test the $150 Radeon R7 370, which performs slimly slower than the 270X, but regrettably, we don't have unitary available. And since gamers connected a budget may too experience or comprise considering the older GeForce GTX 750 Ti or GTX 650 Ti Boost, we tested EVGA versions of those, as asymptomatic.

Every game was tested using its in-game bench mark, using the default graphics settings stated unless noted otherwise, with V-Sync and whatever vendor-specific features disabled. We cragfast to 1080p resolving power alone, since going any higher is really pushing these cards far than they're designed to go. The Radeon card game were proven with AMD's newest Catalyst 15.7 drivers, while the GeForce cards used Nvidia's 355.65 drivers.

Grand Theft Auto V is notorious for hogging memory at higher resolutions, merely it scales well and performs admirably at 1080p. Because the game doesn't have preset graphic levels, we enabled FXAA, set all configurable detail settings arranged to Normal, and cranked all the sliders in the Graphics menu to the goop.

Note that frame rates look great here, but they'll omit a bit once you go cranking the details beyond "normal." That said, both the Radeon R9 380 and GTX 960 bump off frame rates Union of 60 frames per second with most options set to High or Very High-level, though we didn't formally benchmark the games using higher detail settings.

Plunderer alert: GTA V is the only unsanded gaming benchmark that the GTX 960 wins.

It manages to keep the run off tight in Dragon Senesce: Inquisition at Immoderate settings, though the performance gap widens in the R9 380's favor at one time you start to tone things back—which you Crataegus oxycantha be likely to do, as dropping pile to High settings lets you crack the fabled 60fps roadblock with the R9 380, and toy with IT with the GTX 960.

Nvidia May claim a send of honor on Middle-globe: Dark of Mordor's splash screens, but AMD's cards dead pound GeForce GPUs in performance. The Radeon R9 380 again flirts with 60fps on Ultra settings—which we test by manually cranking all graphics option to its highest setting, though we do non employment the elective memory-gobbling HD Ultra Texture Tamp on 1080p cards—and beats the GTX 960 by roughly 15fps at High settings. Whew.

All art card proven, even the $150 models, easily surpass 60fps on Alien: Closing off's Ultra mount. Like GTA V, this back scales like a chomp—but it'll scare the crap out of you. Seriously, this is a terrifying, stress-inducing gamey. It's wonderful.

Next page: Gambling benchmarks continued; 3DMark Fire Strike, heat, and index use results.

Bioshock Infinite is both our incumbent on Unreal Engine 3 title, as well as a popular game that some Nvidia and AMD take up had plenty of time to optimize their drivers for. Again, the R9 380 beatniks the GTX 960 SSC, by almost 5fps.

Sleeping Dogs: Definitive Edition's anti-aliasing options manhandle graphics cards at the Extreme preset. Both $200 graphics cards ace 60fps on Upper and perform around similarly, with the AMD card again holding a slight inch finished Nvidia's.

Metro: Final Light Revived is a gorgeous HD remaster of an impressive, densely part gamy. The Sung dynasty remains the homophonic here: The VisionTek R9 380 holds a slight lead o'er the EVGA GTX 960 SSC, though both do fountainhead on Ultra settings.

The VisionTek Radeon R9 380's the clear winner in 3DMark's synthetic, but wide respected Fire Strike benchmark, as well.

King manipulation is where AMD's carte stumbles a trifle, as was common. AMD's Radeon GPUs just aren't arsenic efficient as Nvidia's king-sipping Maxwell computer architecture. Power is measured by plugging the entire organisation into a Watts Skyward meter, and then running a stress screen with Furmark—which both AMD and Nvidia dub a "ability virus"—for 15 minutes.

VisionTek's cooler handles the excess heat with aplomb, yet. Temperatures for the Radeon R9 380 and the EVGA GTX 960 SSC are roughly equilateral, and both are beautiful chilly.

Final page: Ratiocination

Bottom line: The new 1080p champ

Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder it all up and there's only one termination to reach: Disdain the high power trace, the Radeon R9 380 is clearly the best graphics wit for the money in the $200 price range. It consistently out-performs the heavy overclocked GTX 960 SSC in everything but GTA V, though Nvidia's tease hangs intimately enough to be tempting if the R9 380's power depict is a concern, or if you're building a home theater PC and need an HDMI 2.0 port to output a 60Hz signal to a 4K TV. (The GTX 950 supports HDMI 2.0; the Radeon R9 380 is moderate to HDMI 1.4a's 30Hz at 4K.)

For your money, you'll get a mostly uncompromising mainstream 1080p gaming experience, hovering around 60fps at Ultra settings in many cases, though you may need to muffle some of the Thomas More extreme anti-aliasing options or set the art options to Malodourous in some of most strenuous titles—but only if the 60fps roadblock is sacrosanct to you. If you're fine with a console table-quality 30fps, the VisionTek Radeon R9 380 never faltered beneath that mark, even with all the bells and whistles enabled in the most strenuous games.

But if console-quality graphics aren't a bother, you can save up some money by dropping down to the $150-$170 price range, where the tables turn and Nvidia's GeForce GTX 950 reigns supreme. Art cards in this browse can hit 40fps-plus at 1080p on High graphics settings.

VisionTek's Radeon R9 380.

For most people, we'd advocate saving your pennies for a few weeks more and stepping up to the $200 price range. The leap in art performance is heavy, delivering a much more compelling 1080p gambling experience for a price that still won't break the bank. It's crazy how much performance you can get for $200 these days (though the R9 380 is not an upgrade from the older R9 280 and 280X, which were priced higher).

When Nvidia's GeForce GTX 960 made its debut, we said that AMD needed to send packing the Radeon R9 285's Price to $200 to remain competitive. With the Radeon R9 380, AMD did just that—and the pocket-size bit of unscheduled desirableness in the identity card's clock speeds serve shuffle AMD's offering the most tempting for mainstream gamers today.

As far the specific vendor execution goes, the VisionTek Radeon R9 380's old-hat-clocked offering Crataegus laevigata not push the envelope as fiercely as both other custom-cooled designs on the commercialise, simply the overall package is very clean and competent indeed, and that limited lifetime warranty is pretty darn enticing.

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Brad Chacos spends his years digging through screen background PCs and tweeting too much.

Source: https://www.pcworld.com/article/423413/amd-radeon-r9-380-review-the-best-200-graphics-card-you-can-buy-for-1080p-gaming.html

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