The card
Like the name of the card indicates, the PowerColor Radeon R9 280X
TurboDuo OC is equiped with their new TurboDuo cooler introduced with the Radeon
R9 series. In this case you get three pure copper GSG-shaped heatpipes that have
a diameter of 8 millimeter. The heatpipes are not in direct contact with the
core, there is a pure copper base inbetween. Soldered to the heatpipes you find
the fin stack which is being provided with fresh air via two 90mm fans. The fans
are manufactured by PowerLogic and carry the model number PLD09210D12HH.
Overall the cooler is well made and finished. Good thermal paste has been used
and the copper base actually has a nice finish, not mirror though. Memory chips
aren't actively cooled.
For its Radeon R9 280X TurboDuo OC, PowerColor makes use of an AMD
Radeon HD 7970 reference design PCB. The PCB is identical, the only
changes we noticed is that the power design components are different and there
is the full number of phases, 6+1+1+1 (GPU-Memory-PLL-PCIe) phases for the
TurboDuo card versus 5+1+1+1 for the reference 7970 card. Other than that
PowerColor also put a small aluminium heatsink on the MOSFETs of the main VRM to
actively cool them.
Checking the voltage regulation chip we find a digital multi-phase controller
CHiL CHL8228G from International Rectifier that is taking care of both GPU and
memory.
The memory chips used are made by Elpida and carry the model number
W2032BBBG-6A-F. They are specified to run at 1'500 MHz (6'000 MHz effective).