Sapphire Radeon RX 590 Nitro+: New 1080p gaming champion
AMD’s Radeon RX 590 is the best 1080p graphics card you can buy, and at $280, it won’t break the bank. But the Sapphire Radeon RX 590 Nitro+ we’re reviewing today proves it’s even better than we originally thought. The card draws an immense amount of power, and the XFX Radeon RX 590 Fatboy that AMD sent U.S. reviewers ran hot despite coming equipped with a massive triple-slot cooler. Pushing AMD’s Polaris architecture so far—this is the same GPU’s third incarnation, after the Radeon RX 480 and 580—requires heavy metal, we concluded at the time. While that’s still true, Sapphire’s graphics card shows that the Radeon RX 590 doesn’t have to be gargantuan.
The bright blue Sapphire Radeon RX 590 Nitro+ ($280 on Newegg) comes loaded with features. Even more impressively, it manages to hit higher frame rates and lower temperatures than the XFX Fatboy despite fitting in a standard two-slot design. This is the best Radeon RX 590 we’ve tested.
SPECS, FEATURES, AND PRICE
The Radeon RX 590 is almost identical to the Radeon RX 580 under the hood, utilizing the same underlying configuration, but on an improved 12nm manufacturing process. That process shrink lets AMD’s new GPU hit much faster speeds than the Radeon RX 580 and RX 570, which will continue to be sold as well.
Here’s how all three of AMD’s mainstream graphics options compare spec-wise:
The Sapphire Radeon RX 590 Nitro+ pushes performance even further. It ships with a
