An inside source at AMD recently told us that it has allowed its AIB partners to start manufacturing and selling 8 GB variants of the R9 290X graphics card. At the time, we knew that Sapphire, MSI, and PowerColor were all building their 8 GB cards, and now XFX has joined in.
The news was posted by VideoCardz.com, which shows images of an XFX R9 290X with an 8 GB sticker on it. On the graphics card we see the company's custom "Ghost2" cooler, which is an open-air unit with two fans that push cold air through a dense aluminum fin array. It also has a glowing XFX logo.
Aside from the increased frame buffer, the 8 GB R9 290X cards are identical to their 4 GB counterparts. The added memory may not be especially useful when it comes to Full HD gaming on a single display, but for 4K gaming, there will be situations where the 8 GB will help performance, especially in multi-card configurations.
We'd like to try to estimate how much the 8 GB cards will cost, but unfortunately, that's rather difficult. 4 GB Radeon R9 290X prices are now all over the place, with recent promotions bringing them down to as low as $330. 8 GB cards have already hit a retailer over in the UK, though it remains unsure when, if ever, the 8 GB cards will actually be coming to the U.S.
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