AMD’s R9 290X is without a doubt one of the most popular graphics cards currently on the market. Be it crypto currency miners or gamers who want access to technologies like Mantle and TrueAudio, these GPUs have become a hot commodity. Board partners are struggling to keep pace with demand while at the same time developing and launching their own custom designs. Gigabyte’s R9 290X WindForce OC is a prime example of this; it’s a ground-up redesign on Gigabyte’s part and it carries one heck of a price premium.

Let’s start with the obvious first. In order to cut down on the rampant heat of AMD’s reference design and maximize clock speeds, this particular R9 290X is decked out with Gigabyte’s excellent WindForce 3X heatsink design. We’ve had excellent results with this in the past and this one will surely be no different.