AMD R9 290X Pictures Leaked

Alleged pictures of AMD’s upcoming high-end graphics card have been leaked to the web over the weekend. The images posted show the whole card with heatsink removed, making it easy to spot the resemblance with HD 7970 cards.

The leaked pictures show the whole board boasting what is said to be AMD’s new Hawaii GPU. The PCB is quite similar to the reference design for Tahiti, also known as Radeon HD 7970. It packs 5+1 power phases fed by one 6-pin PCI-E connector and one 8-pin connector. We count 16 memory chips, which at 2Gbits per chip would make for a total of 4GB of GDDR5 memory. At this point, it is believed that the memory operates on a 512-bit wide bus. Factory GPU and memory clocks are still unknown and are anyone’s guess, so is GPU shaders count, so we won’t comment on that until we know better. As we reported just a few days ago, the new GPU is built on the mature 28nm process from TSMC and is slightly larger than its predecessor.

The PCB seems to have the same dimensions as its predecessor, while the backplate has been changed a little, ditching the two mini Display Ports for what appears to be a full-size DP, a full-size HDMI and two stacked DVI connectors. The reference cooler is reported to be a blower-style, very similar to what AMD used in their previous generation of graphics cards.

The new card is expected to be available in retail within weeks. Rumor is growing that the new products will come with a totally new nomenclature, parting with what could’ve been HD 9000-series of products. The new high-end card based on Hawaii is to be called R9 290X. This info is backed by reports that another card, the midrange R7 260X, has been pictured too. It is not known at this moment if AMD intends to launch a full line of graphics cards and if those will reach the market in 2013.

Source: Xbit Labs

– dostov