The PowerColor 270X PCS+ Review

Performance summary charts & graphs

Following are two summary charts of 30 modern PC games and 4 synthetic benches. The highest settings are generally chosen and it is DX11 when there is a choice; DX10 is picked above DX9, and the settings are generally ultra or maxed unless specified on the chart. Specific settings are listed on the charts. The benches are run at 1920×1080 and 2560×1600.  2560×1600 is rather high for a Pitcarin-class GPU, but will offer consistency across our entire benchmark suite.  The R9 270X is particularly good bang-for-buck for 1920×1080 with maximum settings as the charts will show.

First up, we want to compare the slightly less expensive $189 GTX 660 with the $199 PowerColor R9 270X PCS+ with it running at reference speeds in the first column, at factory-clocked PCS+ speeds, and finally overclocked to 1215MHz/1500MHz.  For a further comparison, we will see the $249 GTX 760 in the next column followed by the more expensive R9 280X and GTX 770.

 The Big Picture

Here is our big picture which places the R9 270X into the mix of generally more expensive cards, right on up to the thousand dollar GTX 690 and Titan.  We can see that at 1920×1080, it gives excellent performance for a $200 card.

In most cases, the $199 R9 270X sits above the $189 GTX 660 just as the $249 GTX 760 sits above it. Once we overclock the PowerColor 270X PCS+ beyond its own mild overclock, we see it narrow the gap with the more expensive GeForce, beating it in many cases. Let’s head to our conclusion.