The AMD Radeon R9 Nano Review: The Power of Size
by Ryan Smith on September 10, 2015 8:00 AM ESTGRID Autosport
For the racing game in our benchmark suite we have Codemasters’ GRID Autosport. Codemasters continues to set the bar for graphical fidelity in racing games, delivering realistic looking environments layered with additional graphical effects. Based on their in-house EGO engine, GRID Autosport includes a DirectCompute based advanced lighting system in its highest quality settings, which incurs a significant performance penalty on lower-end cards but does a good job of emulating more realistic lighting within the game world.
At 3840x2160 we see the R9 Nano only barely fall behind the R9 Fury, trailing it by less than a percent. Unfortunately R9 Nano can’t quite make 60fps here, which for AMD is limited to the R9 Fury X.
The problem for AMD here is that in lieu of hitting 60fps at 4K, the next best option is to drop down to 2560x1440, at which point AMD’s CPU limitations come into full force, allowing the GTX 980 to leapfrog the entire Fiji family. Ultimately this isn’t anything we haven’t seen before, but it’s a greater problem for a luxury card like the R9 Nano.
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looncraz - Thursday, September 10, 2015 - link
Indeed. At $200 cheaper I'd consider buying two of them, rather than none.The lack of a DL-DVI port, though, would probably limit me to just one.
Alexvrb - Saturday, September 12, 2015 - link
Agreed I think it's a great compact card but for their sake I hope they drop the price gradually as yields improve. Personally I will be waiting to see what happens with HBM2, I'm hoping that with the improvements in density they'll be able to push it into mid-range cards as well next time.Oxford Guy - Thursday, September 10, 2015 - link
I didn't see much about DX 12 and how it should counter all the energy efficiency stuff that is being pretty much obsessed about. The conclusion, for instance, talks so much about energy efficiency when in fact the real point of this card is not performance per watt but the form factor.I don't see anything about Ashes — not even a word about why it wasn't included.
Ryan Smith - Thursday, September 10, 2015 - link
"I don't see anything about Ashes — not even a word about why it wasn't included."We don't include non-release software in our GPU evaluations. Ashes isn't a complete game, it's still an alpha.
AS118 - Thursday, September 10, 2015 - link
I feel like that's totally valid. Until multiple finalized DX12 benches come out, I don't feel that we can really understand how current cards will work with DX12.Oxford Guy - Friday, September 11, 2015 - link
It still merits a mention, even if it's just to say that.AS118 - Thursday, September 10, 2015 - link
I agree. In fact, this review seems as honest as every other Nano one. They all say "it's niche" and "it's too expensive for the performance if you don't need the small size, and regardless of what Roy said, the sites that were given a card are quite critical of the Nano, and most recommend getting a bigger, faster, cheaper card instead if you don't need something tiny.They say "It's a great product, but only for people that really must have the strongest mini-card".
RussianSensation - Thursday, September 10, 2015 - link
Wreckage = trolls like Rollo, but minus the facts.Kutark - Thursday, September 10, 2015 - link
Whats the Roy Taylor incident? Im not aware.at80eighty - Friday, September 11, 2015 - link
If there's anyone championing the cause of objectivity, it's you