Well so for some time I was very keen to really test out the power of the GTX 980 after using the R9 390. It retails for around RM2600/ US $660 and is easily available at most PC retailers.
Okay, let’s jump in
01| Unboxing & Showoff!
Well I’d just let the box do the talking
02| Design
When it comes to the design of graphics cards, Asus’s implementation of their designs look stunning, to be honest. The GTX 980 Matrix Platinum is equipped with Asus’s DirectCU II cooler which really in my opinion really suits the card’s aesthetics and the cooling needs.
There’s 1x DVI port, 3x Display Ports and lastly 1x HDMI port
Now that we have got an overview of the card. The card sure looks very awesome, no matter what case you’re using. The red and black accent didn’t wreck the blue theme of my PC. But no matter how good the card looks, I was a bit disappointed by the the build quality. That’s not to say its built bad, but I’d have really loved to see its body built of steel instead of plastic. I know the card isn’t the latest addition in the family, but maybe next time, Asus. Overall, that’s my only complaint with the card.
Here’s an overview of the card’s specifications
03| Benchmarks
03| BenchmarksJust to inform you guys that these benchmarks were performed on an Intel Core i7 6700 (Non-K) with 8GB of DDR4 2133MHz RAM. Another point to note is that we aploigize for not including the GTA V benchmarks as the lastest driver was causing issues with GTA V’s benchmark tool. So lets roll in the benchmarks shall we?
Unigine Heaven Benchmark 4.0
[infogram id=”unigine_powercolor_r9_390_axon_benchmark” prefix=”IeI”]
Shadow of Mordor
[infogram id=”som_powercolor_r9_390_benchmark” prefix=”Y3y”]
Battlefield 4
[infogram id=”bf4_benchmark-051″ prefix=”aH9″]
Batman Arkham Knight
[infogram id=”bak_r9_390_powercolor_axon” prefix=”ooc”]
04| Temperatures
Well the temperatures of the card I must say were decent. The graph chart shows the whole story
[infogram id=”powercolor_r9_390_temps” prefix=”ucQ”]
05| Pricing & Conclusion
The pricing of this card is pretty steep.
Pros
- Better performance at 1080p
- Adobe Productivity
- Overclocking
- Premium Aesthetics
Cons:
- Price
- Plastic Build
- Same performance at 1440p and 4k compared to AMD’s lower priced competition
It really a skeptical position here and many people really have their preferences. Anyways that’s all for my review.
