Final Thoughts
In our quest for more pixels and detailed textures, Powercolor’s PCS+ R9 290X turned out to be everything we needed and more. 8GB of VRAM delivered the space and performance required to push those pixels, and backed up by the already established R9 290X. We got a monster of a card that performs above expectations and remains very cool. Aside from the cooler taking up 3 expansion slots and being as large as some of the premium cards, we can agree that there is no better choice when searching for high video memory graphics card to power your latest games.
Performance wise, the PCS+ R9 290X utilizes SK Hynix memory modules are by far my favorite for overclocking and regarded as some of the best performing memory. We were able to push the memory to 1575Mhz without breaking a sweat, it delivered an unparalleled performance when compared to the 4GB version of the R9 290X. Framerates, texture load time, and pop ins were an issue that was present and prevalent when testing a 4GB card at high resolutions, but was no where to be found when tested with Powercolor’s PCS+ R9 290X.
Looking at the competition, only overly expensive cards go over the 6GB mark. We felt the Powercolor PCS+ R9 290X is the only card to hit the performance sweet spot for speed, memory availability, cooling, noise, and price. With all the controversy regarding the Nvidia GTX 970’s memory issue, we know gamers treasure their memory and the PCS+ utilizes every single megabyte.
Anyone looking to play at 4K or load up Skyrim with 100+ mods should take a serious look at Powercolor’s PCS+ R9 290X 8GB card. Uncompressed raw textures and unoptimized memory hungry games are becoming quite common with today’s top tier video game released for PC, it would be wise to future proof yourself with an amazing card such as PCS+ R9 290X. The great performance, overclocking headroom, and the cool and quite operation was just the icing on the cake. I could continue non-stop about how great Powercolor’s PCS+ R9 290X 8GB is but I will keep it short and say that I completely recommend this card.
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