PowerColor Devil 13 Dual Core R9 390 Video Card Review @ [H]

[extide]

Well, we've been talking about whether this would be possible on standard 120V 15A home wiring, without using dual power supplies, one each plugged into a different outlet on a different circuit

Consider this.

With a single card in the system at load it drew 802W.

As has been mentioned before, you are only supposed to draw 80% of a circuits rated power as a constant condition, only spiking into full load.

This means the total available power at the wall you can draw is 1440VA. Assuming we have an 80 plus PSU (that is actually performing within spec) the requirement is that you ahve at least a 0.9 power factor, meaning the most you can draw froma single 15a wall outlet to a PC power supply is about 1296W.

Not sure you'd be able to add a second one, without a second PSU, on a separate outlet residing on a separate circuit.

Power factor is not the right term to use here. That is something entirely different. (Has to do with the phasing of the current draw vs the phase of the voltage sinewave)

The word you are looking for is simply efficiency -- 90% efficiency in your case.

 

[Kalmado]

Thinking very hard about getting this instead of two separate 390s. Only thing that worries me is the noise. I do have a Kraken G10 bracket to use for one 390 if I decide to get them. My thing is, I can sell the Razer mouse included for at least $50 making this gpu $450 ($225 for each 390). Buying separate would cost at minimum $250 each right now then the added cost of getting an AIO for the Kraken. Someone sway me in the right direction!

 

[N4CR]

Thinking very hard about getting this instead of two separate 390s. Only thing that worries me is the noise. I do have a Kraken G10 bracket to use for one 390 if I decide to get them. My thing is, I can sell the Razer mouse included for at least $50 making this gpu $450 ($225 for each 390). Buying separate would cost at minimum $250 each right now then the added cost of getting an AIO for the Kraken. Someone sway me in the right direction!

I nearly pulled trigger on this too. Ended up saving $ with a used 290x DCUII and I'm happy with it at 1440p to tie me over until polaris. Have a feeling it's quieter than the dual 390 setup. Still need to grab a mouse as mine went swimming..
I think the rarity and resale of the card would be cool, its definitely something unique.

 

[Kalmado]

I nearly pulled trigger on this too. Ended up saving $ with a used 290x DCUII and I'm happy with it at 1440p to tie me over until polaris. Have a feeling it's quieter than the dual 390 setup. Still need to grab a mouse as mine went swimming..
I think the rarity and resale of the card would be cool, its definitely something unique.

I have a 4k monitor so I can definitely use it. I haven't found any video reviews of this card which stinks because I'd love to be able to hear it. Speaking of rarity, 7990s and 295x2s are selling so high right now. Makes me wish I would've held onto my 7990 longer.

 

[tungt88]

Fun to note that Powercolor did (more or less) exactly what HardOCP recommended in the review endnotes: they currently offer a rebate for $100, and you can sell the mouse for a decent price. This makes the card a ridiculously good deal until Polaris/Pascal.

 

[harmattan]

Exactly. I'm stupified Powercolor is selling these so cheap with a quality mouse to boot. You can't find a used GPU solution that puts out this much power for $500 ($450-ish if you sell the mouse), much less something new. I almost want to sell my 295x2 for this, but it would be a bit of a side grade for my purposes.

 

[tungt88]

Exactly. I'm stupified Powercolor is selling these so cheap with a quality mouse to boot. You can't find a used GPU solution that puts out this much power for $500 ($450-ish if you sell the mouse), much less something new. I almost want to sell my 295x2 for this, but it would be a bit of a side grade for my purposes.

My guess would be that Powercolor knows something we don't, and Polaris will be a true, major upgrade over Hawaii, as Kyle hinted several months back. (The same might be said of Pascal over Maxwell, but admittedly the GTX 980 Ti is a stellar performer when overclocked -- Wizzard over @ TPU thinks that stock Pascal will match a heavily overclocked GTX 980 Ti [20-25% more performance than a stock GTX 980 Ti] -- he had the Gigabyte G1 in mind).

Or maybe that the card wasn't selling well due to the cost, and they needed to make money back. Either way, the (factored-in) price makes this card a fantastic deal for "bang-for-the-buck" 1440/4K play on most games.