The AMD Radeon R9 Fury Review, Feat. Sapphire & ASUS
by Ryan Smith on July 10, 2015 9:00 AM ESTDragon Age: Inquisition
Our RPG of choice for 2015 is Dragon Age: Inquisition, the latest game in the Dragon Age series of ARPGs. Offering an expansive world that can easily challenge even the best of our video cards, Dragon Age also offers us an alternative take on EA/DICE’s Frostbite 3 engine, which powers this game along with Battlefield 4.
Dragon Age is another solid win for AMD at 4K, with the R9 Fury taking an 8-11% lead over the GTX 980. However it’s also a game that’s better played at 1440p than 4K on the R9 Fury, at which point that lead shrinks to just 2%. At the very least the R9 Fury can claim to be the minimum card required to crack 60fps at that resolution, a feat the GTX 980 falls just short of.
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Oxford Guy - Saturday, July 11, 2015 - link
2% cost difference is likely to be erased by sale pricing at various times.darkfalz - Saturday, July 11, 2015 - link
My 980 is about 15% from stock, and it's a poor overclocker despite running cool. These cards struggle to hit 10%. I also can't go back 6 months ago and buy a R9 Fury. And Nvidia's next release is likely around the corner. I think they're approximately equal value - which is good for AMD fans, but it's been a long wait for them to have a card comparable to what NVIDIA enthusiasts have been enjoying for a year!Flunk - Friday, July 10, 2015 - link
It's nice to see AMD win a segment. I'm not sure that the Fury X matters that much in the grand scheme of things, seeing that it's the same price as the better performing Geforce 980 TI.The Fury seems to overclock to almost match the Fury X, making it a good enthusiast buy.
cmikeh2 - Friday, July 10, 2015 - link
If you're willing to over clock though, you can get a good 15+ percent out of the 980 and pretty much bring it even with an OCed Fury for a little less money.looncraz - Friday, July 10, 2015 - link
But as soon as voltage control is unlocked the fury will probably eek out at least another 100MHz or more, which will put it healthily out of reach of the 980. And, once a few more driver issues (such as GTA V performance) the performance of the Fury will improve even more.HBM has a different performance profile, and AMD is still accommodating that. And, of course, if you turn the nVidia image quality up to AMD levels, nVidia loses a few extra percent of performance.
The GTX 980 vs R9 Fury question is easy to answer (until a 980 price drop). The Fury X vs 980 Ti question is slightly more difficult (but the answer tends to go the other way, the AIO cooler being the Fury X's main draw).
D. Lister - Saturday, July 11, 2015 - link
"if you turn the nVidia image quality up to AMD levels, nVidia loses a few extra percent of performance."Surely we have some proof to go along with that allegation... ?
silverblue - Saturday, July 11, 2015 - link
I've heard the same thing, although I believe it was concerning the lack of anisotropic filtering on the NVIDIA side. However, anisotropic filtering is very cheap nowadays as far as I'm aware, so it's not really going to shake things up much whether it's on OR off, though image quality does improve noticeably.D. Lister - Saturday, July 11, 2015 - link
Err...http://international.download.nvidia.com/webassets...
You mean to say that it doesn't work like it is supposed to?
silverblue - Monday, July 13, 2015 - link
I'm not sure what you're getting at. In any case, I was trying to debunk the myth that turning off AF makes a real difference to performance.FlushedBubblyJock - Wednesday, July 15, 2015 - link
no, there's no proof, the proof of course is inside the raging gourd of the amd fanboy, never be unlocked by merely sane mortal beings.