Mobility Radeon HD 5870 Crossfire vs Radeon R9 290X

In this comparison between Mobility Radeon HD 5870 Crossfire and Radeon R9 290X you will find out which graphics card performs better in today's games. Bear in mind that third-party versions may have more efficient cooling and higher clock speeds. This will increase cards' performance, though not by much. In addition to raw power you should also take into account the dimensions. Thicker models simply will not fit into a small mini-ITX case. The resolution of your monitor also affects the choice, since 4K gameplay requires a more powerful GPU. And don't overspend on the graphics card. Other parts of your build may also need to be upgraded, save some money for the CPU or power supply. For some people Mobility Radeon HD 5870 Crossfire will be the best choice, for others Radeon R9 290X will be their preference. Study the comparison tables below and make your choice.

Mobility Radeon HD 5870 Crossfire is a Laptop Graphics Card

Note: Mobility Radeon HD 5870 Crossfire is only used in laptop graphics. It has lower GPU clock speed compared to the desktop variant, which results in lower power consumption, but also 10-30% lower gaming performance. Check available laptop models with Mobility Radeon HD 5870 Crossfire here:

Main Specs

  Mobility Radeon HD 5870 Crossfire Radeon R9 290X
Power consumption (TDP) 120 Watt 250 Watt
Interface PCIe 3.0 x16
Supplementary power connectors 1 x 6-pin + 1 x 8-pin
Memory type DDR3, GDDR3, GDDR5 GDDR5
Maximum RAM amount 2x1 GB 4 GB
Display Connectors 2x DVI, 1x HDMI, 1x DisplayPort
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  • Radeon R9 290X has 108% more power consumption, than Mobility Radeon HD 5870 Crossfire.
  • Radeon R9 290X has 2 GB more memory, than Mobility Radeon HD 5870 Crossfire.
  • Mobility Radeon HD 5870 Crossfire is used in Laptops, and Radeon R9 290X - in Desktops.
  • Mobility Radeon HD 5870 Crossfire is build with Terascale 2 architecture, and Radeon R9 290X - with GCN.
  • Mobility Radeon HD 5870 Crossfire is manufactured by 40 nm process technology, and Radeon R9 290X - by 28 nm process technology.
  • Memory clock speed of Radeon R9 290X is 250 MHz higher, than Mobility Radeon HD 5870 Crossfire.

Game benchmarks

high / 1080p 16−18 35−40
ultra / 1080p 9−10 24−27
QHD / 1440p 4−5 18−20
4K / 2160p 10−11
low / 720p 30−35 60−65
medium / 1080p 18−20 45−50
The average gaming FPS of Radeon R9 290X in Assassin's Creed Odyssey is 137% more, than Mobility Radeon HD 5870 Crossfire.

Full Specs

  Mobility Radeon HD 5870 Crossfire Radeon R9 290X
Architecture Terascale 2 GCN
Code name Broadway-XT Hawaii XT
Type Laptop Desktop
Release date 7 January 2010 24 October 2013
Pipelines 1600 2816
Core clock speed 700 MHz
Boost Clock 947 MHz
Transistor count 6,200 million
Manufacturing process technology 40 nm 28 nm
Texture fill rate 176.0
Floating-point performance 5,632 gflops
Length 275 mm
Memory bus width 128 Bit 512 Bit
Memory clock speed 1000 MHz 1250 MHz
Memory bandwidth 320 GB/s
Shared memory - -
DirectX DirectX 11, Shader 5.0
Shader Model 6.3
OpenGL 4.6
OpenCL 2.0
Vulkan +
Monero / XMR (CryptoNight) 0.76 kh/s
FreeSync +
Bus support PCIe 3.0
HDMI +
Bitcoin / BTC (SHA256) 623 Mh/s
Laptop size large
Eyefinity +
HD3D +
TrueAudio +
Design reference
DisplayPort support +
CrossFire +
DDMA audio +
Decred / DCR (Decred) 1.07 Gh/s
Ethereum / ETH (DaggerHashimoto) 25.75 Mh/s
Zcash / ZEC (Equihash) 350 Sol/s
AppAcceleration +
LiquidVR +
TressFX +
UVD +
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