Following its previous announcement, Asus has released more information on the Republic of Gamers STRIX RX 480 graphics card. Pricing is still a mystery but the factory overclocked card will be available in the middle of next month!
In my previous coverage, I detailed that the STRIX RX 480 would be using a custom PCB along with Asus' DirectCU III cooler and Aura RGB back lighting. Yesterday, Asus revealed that the card also has a custom VRM solution that, in an interesting twist, draws all of the graphics card's power from the two PCI-E power connectors and nothing from the PCI-E slot. This would explain the inclusion of both a 6-pin and 8-pin power connector on the card! I do think that it is a bit of an over-reaction to not draw anything from the slot, but it is an interesting take on powering a graphics card and I'm interested to see how it all works out once the reviews hit and overclockers get a hold of it!
The custom graphics card is assembled using Asus' custom "Auto Extreme" automated assembly process and uses "Super Alloy Power II" components (which is to say that Asus claims to be using high quality hardware and build quality). The DirectCU III cooler is similar to the one used on the STRIX GTX 1080 and features direct contact heatpipes, an aluminum fin stack, and three Wing Blade fans that can spin down to zero RPMs when the card is being used on the desktop or during "casual gaming." The fan shroud and backplate are both made of metal which is a nice touch. Asus claims that the cooler is 30% cooler and three times quieter than the RX 480 reference cooler.
Last but certainly not least, Asus revealed boost clock speeds! The STRIX RX 480 will clock up to 1,330 MHz in OC Mode and up to 1,310 MHz in Gaming Mode. Further Asus has not touched the GDDR5 memory frequency which stays at the reference 8 GHz. Asus did not reveal base (average) GPU clocks. I was somewhat surprised by the factory overclock as I did not expect much out of the box, but 1,330 MHz is fairly respectable. This card should have a lot more headroom beyond that though, and fortunately Asus provides software that will automatically overclock the card even further with one click (GPU Tweak II also lets advanced users manually overclock the card). Users should be able to hit at least 1,450 MHz assuming they do decently in the silicon lottery.
For reference, stock RX 480s are clocked at 1,120 MHz base and up to 1,266 MHz boost. Asus claims their factory overclock results in a 15% higher score in 3DMark Fire Strike and 19% more performance in DOOM and Hitman.
Other features of the STRIX RX 480 include FanConnect which is two 4-pin fan headers that allows users to hook up two case fans and allow them to be controlled by the GPU. Aura RGB LEDs on the shroud and backplate allow users to match their build aesthetics. Asus also includes XSplit GameCaster for game streaming with the card.
No word on pricing yet, but you will be able to get your hands on the card in the middle of next month (specifically "worldwide from mid-August")!
This card is definitely one of the most interesting RX 480 designs so far and I am anxiously awaiting the full reviews!
How far do you think the triple fan cooler can push AMD's Polaris 10 XT GPU?
I figured that this was worth
I figured that this was worth it's own post since we have a few new details: clocks, release date, and the reveal of why they had 2 PCI-E power connectors. Apparently they used custom PCB/VRMs and are drawing 100% of the card's power from the 6-pin and 8-pin connectors 0.o Seems a bit overboard to not touch the slot at all but maybe it will be more stable when highly overlocked only pulling from one source? I guess we'll see!
Well that gets the PCI power
Well that gets the PCI power delivery issues completely out of the picture, no matter what crappy motherboard SKU is used. It makes the power load balancing issues simpler with any power supply plugs and cables being more robust than motherboard traces.
Still AMD’s solutions wasn’t
Still AMD’s solutions wasn’t as bad as many where shouting all over the place, drawing extra power from the PCIe bus.
There are only half a dozen motherboard makes and 4 out of 5 motherboards are build from Gigabyte(17 million motherboards sold), ASUS(17 million) and MSI(4.5 millions, about 10 millions the others). If, even the cheaper motherboard out there, from those 3 manufacturers can work with 85-90W power draw from the PCIe bus, then in fact, it was never an issue. All those three motherboard manufacturers also produce reference RX 480 boards. If there was a problem then they wouldn’t have made any reference RX 480 cards. Instead they would have updated their official sites informing people that the RX 480 is incompatible with their motherboards.
On the other hand, there are plenty of $20, 600W PSUs, that in reality barely support 250W at +12V. Now take a PSU like that and ask from that PSU to go far beyond the 75W limit from a 6pin PCIe connector, that should never offer in the first place because based on it’s specs it looks like being build for an Athlon XP system(too many amber at +3.3V and +5V lines).
Yes but this SKU comes with
Yes but this SKU comes with 6-pin and 8-pin power, so the card can have plenty of extra room and no dependency on the PCI power traces. The poast you replied to is regarding this SKU and its power obtained from 6 and 8 pin plugs.
Sure the Motherboard makers overbuild thier motherboard designs because the GPU makers are always pushing the limits and the motherboard makers want to avoid RMAs.
There are some OEM designs that have poor mainboard power support and this card will be great for that usage.
One more looooooooooooong
One more looooooooooooong card with lights and fans.
August is a little late. I can’t understand why AMD delayed the custom boards. GTX 1060 comes at 19th and all RX 480 cards seem to start their availability after that date. 21-22 is for Powercolor and Sapphire, ASUS gives priority to Nvidia and delays it’s custom RX 480 to mid August.
Bad idea in my opinion from AMD – I believe it is AMD’s idea to delay custom RX to after GTX 1060 reviews. Maybe they don’t believe that the custom RX 480 boards would be offering better competition to the GTX 1060. At least to me they give that impression.
And even if the custom cards do offer something more, GTX 1060 reviews will have a clear conclusion about GTX 1060 being faster than the reference RX 480. No mention there about having tested a custom RX 480 that was faster the previous day. That’s a marketing mistake from AMD, in my opinion.
Hope you are wrong about the
Hope you are wrong about the reason for the delay being a poor AMD decision.
The lack AM4 motherboards has
The lack AM4 motherboards has me more concerned than any late arrival of AIB custom GPU cards. Will any Bristol Ridge/excavator and DDR4 capable CPUs be ready before Zen is available. I was hopeing for a CPU only desktop Bristol Ridge/AM4 SKU to be available to pair it with an RX480, or 2 RX 480s, for some rendering workloads. That or maybe even dual RX 470s overclocked to offer a better price/performance option. Then I could update to Zen when the Zen SKUs bacome available because of the AM4 motherboard support for BR and Zen.
Yes, me too. We where waiting
Yes, me too. We where waiting for those in March, they didn’t came even in June. Not to mention that ASUS just came out with the third revision of their 990FX Sabertooth motherboard. So I guess AMD is continuing with FM2+ and AM3+ for at least a few more months. They don’t want one more socket in the market. AMD is losing customers who will not invest again in DDR3 memory. Hell, my last Intel processor was bought last… millennium, but if I had to build a new system today I would have gone straight to Intel. I wouldn’t pay again for DDR3. The stupidity in AMD still remains high.
The motherboard makers are
The motherboard makers are missing out because Bristol Ridge/excavator may not be Summit Ridge/Zen, but Bristol Ridge could still help the sales of the AM4 motherboards.
AMD should be more fourthcoming with information about Bristol Ridge on the desktop and the AM4 motherboards MIA status.
From the looks of it it appears like BR/excavator may be only for mobile usage, with no desktop BR SKUs listed, and I’ll be avoiding any laptop BR mobile FX APUs that end in “00” as they will be 15 watt only. It’s dual channel DDR4 and BR mobile FX APUs that end in “30” for 35 watts only. Those single channel memory options at below 35 watts can remain on the shelves and gather dust because I’m not buying.
Does anyone have any news about any AM4/Bristol Ridge Athlons that may be introduced, or other Bristol Ridge/excavator CPU only options for the Desktop/AM4 market?
The motherboard makers are
The motherboard makers are the only who don’t lose. If you don’t buy an AMD ASUS motherboard, you will buy an Intel ASUS motherboard. And because the integrated gpu in Intel is inferior, you might also buy an ASUS graphics card as an extra. Only AMD is losing here.
BR would have been nice on the desktop if DDR4 helps the performance of the integrated GPU. On the other hand, the cpu part will be as bad as any bulldozer, based on the excellent review/analysis from Ian Cutress of Anandtech
http://www.anandtech.com/show/10436/amd-carrizo-tested-generational-deep-dive-athlon-x4-845
With laptops we’ll have to thank again Ian and Anandtech for opening our eyes
http://www.anandtech.com/show/10000/who-controls-user-experience-amd-carrizo-thoroughly-tested
Not that we didn’t already knew that OEMs where producing “Intel certified and approved” AMD laptops.
The the Athlon x4-845(socket
The the Athlon x4-845(socket FM2+) is not an AM4/Bristol Ridge APU. But I want and will wait for an AM4 motherboard. and I’m not buying anymore Intel SOCs just to be stuck eating Intel’s dog food graphics, and some very overpriced dog food at that.
The PC market is shrinking and I’m not wanting any high priced Intel/Nvidia SKUs. I want an AM4 based motherboard with Bristol Ridge desktop CPU options until there are some Zen Options available. I’ll be waiting for AM4 and Zen if there are no AM4 and socketed Bristol Ridge options for PCs.
I have plenty of Intel laptops to last me until there are some better AMD laptop APU/GPU options the have dual channel DDR4 memory and a 35 watt Bristol Ridge part, or Zen/Polaris APU part. I really want a laptop with Polaris graphics so I’ll probably wait for the Zen/Polaris APUs to arrive in 2017. I also want the laptop with Any Zen/Polaris based APU, or discrete Polaris GPU to be available from a Linux OS based Laptop OEM.
I never need to own another Intel Laptop, I own 4 Intel based laptops, and one has an AMD GPU(Terascale micro-arch based). So 4 laptops will last for years until I can get a new laptop that is free of any Intel/Nvidia/Windows parts! a laptop the runs a Linux OS, and an AMD APU with dual channel DDR4 memory, and an APU part that runs at a minimum of least 35 watts, a Bristol Ridge or Zen(more likely Zen/Polaris) APU.
The windows 7 laptops will be getting Linux Mint come 2020, and the one laptop that has windows 7 and the AMD GPU, is actually a windows 8 probook(windows 8 license) that was a factory downgrade from windows 8 pro and pre-loaded with windows 7 pro! So I guess I could install the windows 8 DVD that came with the laptop and update it to 8.1 and Install Start 8, or some other software to get all that TIFKAM mess out of the way and that may last until 8.1’s EOL.
No windows 10 ever, and no more new laptops if I can not find a Linux OS based Laptop OEM that has some AMD BR/Zen APU options, with some Polaris discrete GPU options.
No 845 is not Bristol Ridge,
No 845 is not Bristol Ridge, but it comes with the same excavator cores. So, AM4 cpus might have lower power consumption, even higher base frequency or even turbo, but the IPC will be the same. DDR4 is not going to save them.
You just reminded me that my free upgrade option from Win 7 to Win 10 ends in 10 days. It’s really funny how I forget that. But it’s not funny that I can’t think of any reason to do the upgrade. Even that it is free, because it will cost me my Win 7 key. If Microsoft was giving windows keys for $20-$30 I would consider it. But losing my Win7 key for Windows 10, looks like a bad idea right now. I don’t know if in 2 years I’ll be regretting it, but right now, it does look like I am keeping my win 7 key.
I figured they would just go
I figured they would just go with an 8pin instead of two 6pin connectors. Still might end up picking one up but mid August might be a bit too late.
Street pricing will be an
Street pricing will be an interesting challenge. Seems like you can’t go much beyond the MSRP of the reference card without bumping up against potentially more capable Nvidia products.
Yeah, because Nvidia products
Yeah, because Nvidia products are always more capable… :rolleyes:
Asus may be too late with
Asus may be too late with their custom 480. Sapphire will be selling every single Nitro they can make for sure!
Reference Rx 480 temp is 82c.
Reference Rx 480 temp is 82c. 30% better is 57c. Or measured the other way it’s 63c. Nice the fans must be for show because the fans don’t spin until 60c. So it needs 100% fan to maintain 63c indefinitely. I’m gonna call BS. Where’s the mythical 1600mhz? Surely this beast can hit it. Maybe on LN2 LOL.
Maybe I’ll hit every AMD post just like AMD trolls making their rounds trashing everything Nvidia. That was just shameful trashing the Ansel and VR funhouse thread. Nah. I’ve got better things to do with my time like yes play games with my Nvidia card.
Polaris (apt name)needs extra cooling because it’s hot like a star. Not exactly the brightest though. LOL
Troll away, but your bank
Troll away, but your bank accout is much smaller after JHH and his GPU syndicate gets all your money! And watch as that GPU syndicate further segements its offerings to extract maximum milking for every little bit of GPU performance. The GTX 1060 and no SLI, that’s some segementing right there! You have to overpay to play on JHH’s pricy kit!
JHH has to pay for his
JHH has to pay for his expensive leather jackets somehow, right?
Nvidia is a company run by a business man and a marketing team for profit.
AMD is run by engineers.
I think you need to try
I think you need to try harder at being funny.
SO at those specs it seems
SO at those specs it seems that stock purchasers were shafted 10-15% in performance….not very sporting AMD.
TUT TUT
So, the latest rumors –
So, the latest rumors – probably more than just rumors, don’t know – say that Nvidia is cheating on Doom and Futuremark is trying to make Nvidia cards look better in it’s Time Spy benchmark by not using the most optimal async method.
All things look to change, still everything stays the same.
nVidia throwing all that
nVidia throwing all that sweet money at marketing. Who cares about being up front and open, no, let’s instead be devious and sabotage everything for the consumers. Fanbois will easily pay 1000$ for a GPU if it says nVidia on it and spend countless hours defending it online.
Sad state of affairs the modern consumer finds themselves in.
Asus generally do crappy AMD
Asus generally do crappy AMD graphics cards. Using Nvidia coolers and bad VRAM.
Their 290 cards were total shite.
Better go with sapphire.