Radeon R9 M290X: specs and benchmarks

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Aggregate performance score

Radeon R9 M290X provides poor gaming and benchmark performance at 8.45% of a leader's which is GeForce RTX 4090.

Summary

AMD started Radeon R9 M290X sales 9 January 2014. This is a laptop graphics card based on a GCN 1.0 architecture and made with 28 nm manufacturing process. It is primarily aimed at gamers. 4 GB of GDDR5 memory clocked at 1.2 GHz are supplied, and together with 256 Bit memory interface this creates a bandwidth of 153.6 GB/s.

Compatibility-wise, this is a graphics card attached via PCIe 3.0 x16 interface. Power consumption is at 100 Watt.

Primary details

Some basic facts about Radeon R9 M290X: architecture, market segment, release date etc.

Place in the ranking500
Place by popularitynot in top-100
Power efficiency5.79of 100.00 (Radeon 890M)
ArchitectureGCN 1.0 (2011−2020)
GPU code nameNeptune
Market segmentLaptop
Release date9 January 2014 (10 years ago)

Detailed specifications

Radeon R9 M290X's specs such as number of shaders, GPU base clock, manufacturing process, texturing and calculation speed. These parameters indirectly speak of Radeon R9 M290X's performance, but for precise assessment you have to consider its benchmark and gaming test results.

Pipelines / CUDA cores1280of 21760 (GeForce RTX 5090)
Compute units20
Core clock speed850 MHzof 2670 MHz (Arc B580)
Boost clock speed900 MHzof 3599 MHz (Radeon RX 7990 XTX)
Number of transistors2,800 millionof 208,000 million (B200 SXM 192 GB)
Manufacturing process technology28 nmof 3 nm (Arc Graphics 140V)
Power consumption (TDP)100 Wattof 2400 Watt (Data Center GPU Max Subsystem)
Texture fill rate72.00of 2,554 (Radeon Instinct MI300X)
Floating-point processing power2.304 TFLOPSof 109.7 (GeForce RTX 5090)
ROPs32of 192 (Radeon RX 7900 XTX)
TMUs80of 1280 (Data Center GPU Max NEXT)

Form factor & compatibility

This section provides details about the physical dimensions of Radeon R9 M290X and its compatibility with other computer components. This information is useful when selecting a computer configuration or upgrading an existing one. For desktop graphics cards, it includes details about the interface and bus (for motherboard compatibility) and additional power connectors (for power supply compatibility).

Laptop sizelarge
Bus supportPCIe 3.0 x16
InterfacePCIe 3.0 x16
Supplementary power connectorsNone

VRAM capacity and type

Parameters of memory installed on Radeon R9 M290X: its type, size, bus, clock and resulting bandwidth. Note that GPUs integrated into processors have no dedicated memory and use a shared part of system RAM instead.

Memory typeGDDR5
Maximum RAM amount4 GBof 294912 (Radeon Instinct MI325X)
Memory bus width256 Bitof 8192 Bit (Radeon Instinct MI250X)
Memory clock speed1200 MHzof 20000 (RTX 5000 Ada Generation Mobile)
Memory bandwidth153.6 GB/sof 5,171 GB/s (Radeon Instinct MI300X)
Shared memory-

Connectivity and outputs

Types and number of video connectors present on Radeon R9 M290X. As a rule, this section is relevant only for desktop reference graphics cards, since for notebook ones the availability of certain video outputs depends on the laptop model, while non-reference desktop models can (though not necessarily will) bear a different set of video ports.

Display ConnectorsNo outputs
Eyefinity+

Supported technologies

Technological solutions and APIs supported by Radeon R9 M290X. You'll probably need this information if you need some particular technology for your purposes.

FreeSync+
HD3D+
PowerTune+
DualGraphics+
ZeroCore+
Switchable graphics+

API compatibility

APIs supported by Radeon R9 M290X, sometimes including their particular versions.

DirectXDirectX® 11
Shader Model5.1
OpenGL4.4of 4.6 (GeForce RTX 4090)
OpenCLNot Listed
Mantle+

Benchmark performance

Synthetic benchmark performance of Radeon R9 M290X. The combined score is measured on a 0-100 point scale.


Combined synthetic benchmark score

This is our combined benchmark score. We are regularly improving our combining algorithms, but if you find some perceived inconsistencies, feel free to speak up in comments section, we usually fix problems quickly.

R9 M290X 8.45

Passmark

This is the most ubiquitous GPU benchmark. It gives the graphics card a thorough evaluation under various types of load, providing four separate benchmarks for Direct3D versions 9, 10, 11 and 12 (the last being done in 4K resolution if possible), and few more tests engaging DirectCompute capabilities.

R9 M290X 3256

3DMark 11 Performance GPU

3DMark 11 is an obsolete DirectX 11 benchmark by Futuremark. It used four tests based on two scenes, one being few submarines exploring the submerged wreck of a sunken ship, the other is an abandoned temple deep in the jungle. All the tests are heavy with volumetric lighting and tessellation, and despite being done in 1280x720 resolution, are relatively taxing. Discontinued in January 2020, 3DMark 11 is now superseded by Time Spy.

R9 M290X 6817

3DMark Vantage Performance

3DMark Vantage is an outdated DirectX 10 benchmark using 1280x1024 screen resolution. It taxes the graphics card with two scenes, one depicting a girl escaping some militarized base located within a sea cave, the other displaying a space fleet attack on a defenseless planet. It was discontinued in April 2017, and Time Spy benchmark is now recommended to be used instead.

R9 M290X 23961

3DMark Fire Strike Graphics

Fire Strike is a DirectX 11 benchmark for gaming PCs. It features two separate tests displaying a fight between a humanoid and a fiery creature made of lava. Using 1920x1080 resolution, Fire Strike shows off some realistic graphics and is quite taxing on hardware.

R9 M290X 5294

3DMark Cloud Gate GPU

Cloud Gate is an outdated DirectX 11 feature level 10 benchmark that was used for home PCs and basic notebooks. It displays a few scenes of some weird space teleportation device launching spaceships into unknown, using fixed resolution of 1280x720. Just like Ice Storm benchmark, it has been discontinued in January 2020 and replaced by 3DMark Night Raid.

R9 M290X 33147

Unigine Heaven 3.0

This is an old DirectX 11 benchmark using Unigine, a 3D game engine by eponymous Russian company. It displays a fantasy medieval town sprawling over several flying islands. Version 3.0 was released in 2012, and in 2013 it was superseded by Heaven 4.0, which introduced several slight improvements, including a newer version of Unigine.

R9 M290X 62

Gaming performance

Let's see how good Radeon R9 M290X is for gaming. Particular gaming benchmark results are measured in frames per second. Comparisons with game system requirements are included, but remember that sometimes official requirements may reflect reality inaccurately.

Average FPS across all PC games

Here are the average frames per second in a large set of popular modern games across different resolutions:

Full HD46

FPS performance in popular games

Full HD
Low Preset

Cyberpunk 2077 12−14

Full HD
Medium Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey 21−24
Assassin's Creed Valhalla 12−14
Battlefield 5 24−27
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 16−18
Cyberpunk 2077 12−14
Far Cry 5 18−20
Far Cry New Dawn 24−27
Forza Horizon 4 55−60
Hitman 3 16−18
Horizon Zero Dawn 45−50
Metro Exodus 24−27
Red Dead Redemption 2 21−24
Shadow of the Tomb Raider 27−30
Watch Dogs: Legion 55−60

Full HD
High Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey 21−24
Assassin's Creed Valhalla 12−14
Battlefield 5 24−27
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 16−18
Cyberpunk 2077 12−14
Far Cry 5 18−20
Far Cry New Dawn 24−27
Forza Horizon 4 55−60
Hitman 3 16−18
Horizon Zero Dawn 45−50
Metro Exodus 24−27
Red Dead Redemption 2 21−24
Shadow of the Tomb Raider 27−30
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt 24−27
Watch Dogs: Legion 55−60

Full HD
Ultra Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey 21−24
Assassin's Creed Valhalla 12−14
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 16−18
Cyberpunk 2077 12−14
Far Cry 5 18−20
Forza Horizon 4 55−60
Hitman 3 16−18
Horizon Zero Dawn 45−50
Shadow of the Tomb Raider 27−30
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt 24−27
Watch Dogs: Legion 55−60

Full HD
Epic Preset

Red Dead Redemption 2 21−24

1440p
High Preset

Battlefield 5 16−18
Far Cry New Dawn 12−14

1440p
Ultra Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey 8−9
Assassin's Creed Valhalla 4−5
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 8−9
Cyberpunk 2077 4−5
Far Cry 5 10−11
Forza Horizon 4 30−35
Hitman 3 12−14
Horizon Zero Dawn 18−20
Metro Exodus 10−12
Shadow of the Tomb Raider 9−10
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt 8−9
Watch Dogs: Legion 50−55

1440p
Epic Preset

Red Dead Redemption 2 14−16

4K
High Preset

Battlefield 5 8−9
Far Cry New Dawn 6−7
Hitman 3 5−6
Horizon Zero Dawn 30−35
Metro Exodus 6−7
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt 5−6

4K
Ultra Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey 5−6
Assassin's Creed Valhalla 4−5
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4−5
Cyberpunk 2077 1−2
Far Cry 5 4−5
Forza Horizon 4 10−11
Shadow of the Tomb Raider 4−5
Watch Dogs: Legion 3−4

4K
Epic Preset

Red Dead Redemption 2 8−9

Closest competitors

Radeon R9 M290X's performance relative to its closest rivals among notebook graphics cards.


Radeon R9 M290X 100
Radeon 740M 98.22

NVIDIA equivalent

According to our data, the closest NVIDIA alternative to Radeon R9 M290X is GeForce GTX 680M, which is nearly equal in speed and lower by 2 positions in our ranking.

Here are some closest NVIDIA rivals to Radeon R9 M290X:

Similar GPUs

Here is our recommendation of several graphics cards that are more or less close in performance to the one reviewed.

Recommended processors

These processors are most commonly used with Radeon R9 M290X according to our statistics.

All comparisons with Radeon R9 M290X

Community ratings

Here you can see the user rating of the graphics card, as well as rate it yourself.


3.2 12 votes

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Questions & comments

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