Just recently, a news came out that AMD is preparing or will be releasing a Dual GPU graphics card based on the Hawaii-XT silicon, codenamed “Vesuvius” a.k.a AMD Radeon R9 290X X2. I’m not really surprised to hear this kind of news since dual GPU’s has been a trend for the past few years. And they always came out after AMD or NVIDIA introduced their fastest single GPU graphics card. The previous dual GPU that AMD had was the AMD Radeon HD 7990, where AMD decided to significantly drop its price to compete with NVIDIA’s GTX lineup.





If you have done your research, Vesuvius is a name of a volcano that destroyed Pompeii City, unleashing force a thousand times more powerful than the Atomic Bomb dropped on Hiroshima. So the codename is still somewhat related to the whole “Volcanic” and “Hawaii” themed lineup. AMD might also be trying to say that the upcoming AMD Radeon R9 290X X2 is that powerful, and they are planning to destroy NVIDIA’s faster single and dual GPU with it. By the way, there are a lot of Xs on this product’s name. I hope that AMD came up of a better name than full of X.

One thing that bothers the PC enthusiasts’ community is how AMD will keep this beast cool and quite. I mean, the AMD Radeon R9 290X can reach up to 94 or 95 degrees Celsius on load, how much more will a dual Hawaii GPU chip? Probably a customized water cooling solution would do the trick. Anyway, this is still just a rumor and AMD hasn’t released any official announcement about this card yet.

AMD Radeon R9 290X X2 Specifications

The AMD Radeon R9 290x X2 (Vesuvius) specifications below is just an estimate. It’s not final and yet to be confirmed.

Specifications Radeon R9 290X X2 Radeon R9 290X Radeon HD 7990 Stream Processing Units 2x 2816 2816 2x 2048 ROPs 2x 64 64 2x 32 Graphics Processor 2x Hawaii Hawaii 2x Tahiti Transistors 2x 6200M 6200M 2x 4310M Memory Size 2x 4096 MB 4096 MB 2x 3072 MB Memory Bus Width 2x 512 bit 512 bit 2x 384 bit Core Clock 1000 MHz (TBC) 1000 MHz 1000 MHz Memory Clock 1250 MHz (TBC) 1250 MHz 1500 MHz Price ~$999 (TBC) ~$550 ~$800

Price and Release Date

Currently the price for the Radeon R9 290X X2 Vesuvius as well as its release date is unknown. AMD might release or announce it by the end of this year or probably early next year. My estimate is that AMD might price the R9 290X X2 around $1,000 or $999, since the R9 290X is currently at around $550 USD, to compete with the GTX Titan’s price.