GV-R928XOC-3GD-GA: Poor performance & hot in old DirectX 9 game

[newbieonekenobi]

This is an old machine. Specs:

CPU: Core2Duo e8600 @ 3.33 GHz stock
memory: DDR2 ADATA Vitesta @ 800 MHz stock
GPU (now): R9 280X, the Gigabyte Battlefield 4 edition with WindForce 3 cooling

The card seems to perform worse than my older, weaker cards, both from Gigabyte.

Trying to force nicer AA through Catalyst is not an option, even though it was doable with my previous HD 4850 to some extent. The HD 4850 also seemed to run the game faster, more easily than this new Radeon (though with an aftermarket cooler, as the stock one couldn't cope).

This card also gets hotter and has to run the fans at full speed very soon after launching the game — something that wasn't a problem with my old GeForce 460 with the older version of the same cooling (2 fans only), which was capable of pretty much always staying quiet.

According to tests, the same cooling manages to keep the GeForce 960 at like 23 dbA under load.

Is it possible that this beefy card somehow has poor DirectX 9 performance, despite being so massively well-specced? Or that can't work well with a less-than-current CPU?

The game I'm talking about is Crusader Kings 2, which runs in DirectX 9. It probably isn't particularly well optimized, but it's still a map-based strategic game, it shouldn't be taxing a modern card so hard (especially after how it was a walk in the park for the GTX 460).

Catalyst settings:

AA mode: application
AA samples: application
Filter: standard
AA method: multisampling
morpho: off

aniso mode: application
aniso level: application
texture filtering quality: high quality
surface format optimization: off

vsync off
trible buffering off

tesselation: AMD optimized
max tesselation level: AMD optimized

EDIT: Both case wings removed. System temp okay, CPU temp okay. This card runs 45C idle.

[andrei80]

Your card runs too hot. It should idle at about 30*. In full load, my card( like yours, rev. 2.0) barely goes beyond 70* in Furmark. I have actually defined a more silent fan curve with MSI Afterburner(fans stay below 50%, temp is a little above 70 in demanding games.
If your card overheats, you should RMA it(if it's under warranty) or reseat cooler and change thermal compound.

[AgentFXA]

Your new card is a DX11 and that is a bit more demand/load for your CPU than the old 4850

FSB is only 1333 with your CPU and depending on how much ram you have it won't improve much. I hope your psu wattage fits the R9 280?

The R9 280/380 are hot cards needing a very well ventilated case

I suggest do a passmark with your card and compare results
http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/gpu.php?gpu=Radeon+HD+7950+%2F+R9+280

I think your CPU is too weak to feed this card properly