AMD Radeon R9 380X Review: Fastest GPU Under $250

Name: AMD Radeon R9 380X
Brand: AMD

by Marco Chiappetta — Thursday, November 19, 2015, 09:00 AM EDT

How We Configured Our Test Systems: We tested the graphics cards in this article on a Gigabyte X99 Gaming 5P motherboard powered by an Intel Core i7-5960X octal-core processor and 16GB of Corsair DDR4 RAM. The first thing we did when configuring the test system was enter the system UEFI and set all values to their "high performance" default settings and disable any integrated peripherals that wouldn't be put to use. The memory's X.M.P. profile was enabled to ensure optimal memory performance and the solid state drive was then formatted and Windows 10 Professional x64 was installed and fully updated. When the installation was complete, we d installed all of the drivers, games, and benchmark tools necessary to complete our tests.

HotHardware's Test System

Intel Core i7 Powered

Hardware Used:
Intel Core i7-5960X
(3GHz, Octa-Core)
Gigabyte X99 Gaming 5P
(Intel X99 Chipset)

Radeon R9 380X (Sapphire Nitro)
Radeon R9 390
Radeon R9 285
GeForce GTX 970
GeForce GTX 960

16GB Corsair DDR4-2133
OCZ Vertex 4
Integrated Audio
Integrated Network

Relevant Software:
Windows 10 Pro x64 (10586)
AMD Catalyst 15.11.1 Beta
NVIDIA GeForce Drivers v358.91

Benchmarks Used:
Unigine Heaven v4
3DMark "Fire Strike"
Thief
MIddle-Earth: Shadow Of Mordor
Metro Last Light Redux
FRAPS

Unigine Heaven v4.0 Benchmark

Pseudo-DirectX 11 Gaming

Unigine's Heaven Benchmark v4.0 is built around the Unigine game engine. Unigine is a cross-platform, real-time 3D engine, with support for DirectX 9, DirectX 10, DirectX 11 and OpenGL. The Heaven benchmark--when run in DX11 mode--also makes comprehensive use of tessellation technology and advanced SSAO (screen-space ambient occlusion). It also features volumetric cumulonimbus clouds generated by a physically accurate algorithm and a dynamic sky with light scattering.

Unigine Heaven

The Radeon R9 380X finished well out in front of the Radeon R9 285 and GeForce GTX 960 in our Unigine Heaven tests. If you take a step up to the more expensive cards like the R9 390 or GTX 970, however, there is a lot of additional performance to be had...

Tags: AMD, Radeon, Gaming, graphics, GPU, 380x

Marco Chiappetta

Marco's interest in computing and technology dates all the way back to his early childhood. Even before being exposed to the Commodore P.E.T. and later the Commodore 64 in the early ‘80s, he was interested in electricity and electronics, and he still has the modded AFX cars and shop-worn soldering irons to prove it. Once he got his hands on his own Commodore 64, however, computing became Marco's passion. Throughout his academic and professional lives, Marco has worked with virtually every major platform from the TRS-80 and Amiga, to today's high end, multi-core servers. Over the years, he has worked in many fields related to technology and computing, including system design, assembly and sales, professional quality assurance testing, and technical writing. In addition to being the Managing Editor here at HotHardware for close to 15 years, Marco is also a freelance writer whose work has been published in a number of PC and technology related print publications and he is a regular fixture on HotHardware’s own Two and a Half Geeks webcast. - Contact: marco(at)hothardware(dot)com