Yeah, what's the deal with that power overdrawing?
---------- Post merged on 03-07-2016 at 01:26 AM ----------
Here is one review: http://wccftech.com/amd-rx-480-pcie-power-issue-detailed-overclocking-investigated/
Bottom line - don't overclock it. Wait for custom designs to come out which have extra power connectors.
Desk suggestions:
I have a relatively small desk (approx. 110 cm long) where I keep my monitor, speakers, keyboard, mouse, etc. Currently I have my computer on the carpet which isn't entirely terrible since my case (Fractal Design Define R4) has some sort of short legs and is pretty well sealed. I want, however, to have it a bit elevated to avoid dust among other things (and make vacuuming easier). I don't want to buy one of those tacky "computer desks" or a massive (and expensive) solid wood office desk. Is there some kind of short and long table I can get somewhere, that could support such a wide and heavy case? I suppose I could also try and make it myself with a wooden plank and something solid underneath.
So, ideas?
All power comes from the PSU. Also when the RX480 goes beyond its 150W board power as specified by the PCI SIG, it loads the PCIe slot and the power connectors rather evenly with ~80 W. However, the slot and board are more likely to cause problems or even take damage from that than the 6-pin connector/power cords; it's therefore a stupid oversight by AMD to let this happen. But custom boards by the board partners, which will be the absolute majority of sold cards, should definitely fix that, or the AIBs are even more incompetent.
It's a bit early to tell, but AMD seems to be more ready for the newer APIs, namely DX12 and Vulkan (I'm an Nvidia user by the way, but not a fanboy; I changed "colours" many times in the past ). Tests show that especially on games with asynchronous computing (which is an important part of the newer APIs) they overperform compared to Nvidia cards, while Nvidia cards finally stopped performing "worse" than DX11 versions with Pascal (in that they are performing the same now...). It's apparent with RX 480 which sometimes performs better than a 980 Ti in some DX12 games, which is not its competition at all.
However, this might be because DX12 and Vulkan is not widespread yet, and Nvidia simply did not focus on them because of that. So they might perform much better with their next generations, as the APIs become more common. As it stands though, AMD has the lead here. The issue is though, even with that lead, they don't have GTX 1070 and 1080 beat with RX 480. You might go with stuff like Fury X, but they are old cards with less efficiency now. You might want to wait for Vega cards to decide, if you can wait. If not, we need to wait and see factory overclocked RX 480s and so on. Maaaaaybe their crossfire performance will have you covered, but it's usually not that good to rely on multiple GPU setups.
Long story short: yes, AMD is better in new APIs; no, it's not certain if they'll stay that way; it is definitely a certainty that even with the advantage here, RX 480 loses compared to a 1070 or a 1080. Anyone else want to join in here? I might have missed some things.
Thanks @M4xw0lf and @Gilrond-i-Virdan. I have actually looked into Ikea desks but they do feel too flimsy. Maybe I will look for a regular table instead. I know some computer desks come with some sort of computer stand with wheels and I'd be into something similar: a short, sturdy table thing with or without wheels. Say, 10 to 20 cm above ground, but wide and strong enough to hold a computer. Do they make/sell those?
Thanks @Phinnway. I saw some on Ebay too but I'm undecided about whether I want the computer tower on the desk itself or slightly hidden. I am fond of large, study office desks but they can be quite large.
I do have an idea now. Browsing and searching led me to this:
which I could probably set up by myself from Ikea components. I'll see what I can do and report.
^^ AMD cards are currently better optimized for DX12. The reason why is DX12 shares many similarities with Mantel, an open-source API developed by AMD a few years back. Microsoft took all the good ideas from Mantel and incorporated them into DX12. As a result, AMD engineers are currently more experienced with DX12 than Nvidia engineers are, but it won't stay that way for long.