Sapphire's R9 390 Nitro is an overclocked version of the R9 390 with a large triple-fan cooler that is optimized to deliver good temperatures and low noise levels. With its 40 MHz GPU overclock out of the box, which isn't bad, but could be bigger, the card offers a 3% performance improvement over the stock R9 390 at 1920x1080, which is the resolution I would pick this card for. It can also handle many games at 2560x1440, but you'd ideally want something a little stronger for monitors that size. Compared to the GTX 970, the performance uplift is 7%, and it's also 5% faster than the R9 290X and only 4% slower than the R9 390X, which comes at a significantly higher price. Unfortunately, Sapphire did not overclock the memory chips, which could have provided additional performance improvements.

Sapphire's dual-slot, triple-fan cooler does a good job at keeping the card cool as it only reaches 64°C under load. It also turns off its fans completely in idle, which results in a perfect noise-free experience during desktop work and internet browsing, a feature that's common to most NVIDIA cards today, but rare on AMD models. During gaming, the fan ramps up and becomes noticeable, but with 34 dBA, it is relatively quiet, especially considering the noise levels we have seen on many other AMD cards. Compared to the quietest NVIDIA GTX 970/980 cards, which drop below 30 dBA, the cooler is definitely noisier but not by enough to be a deal breaker. Sapphire's metal backplate comes with a thermal pad that provides a little bit of extra cooling to the VRM circuitry, which is a good choice!

Power efficiency has been the weak point for AMD in recent years, and Sapphire's R9 390 Nitro is no exception as the only difference is that Sapphire's cooler manages to hide the secondary effects of increased power consumption, heat and noise, very well. With 261 W, the Nitro consumes more power than the GTX 980 Ti (211 W) while performing worse; as such, recent NVIDIA cards are roughly 50% more power efficient during gaming.

The R9 390 Nitro is equipped with 8 GB of VRAM, which, while certainly nice to have, adds very little performance considering the added cost. The better memory configuration for a card such would be 4 GB. With a retail price of $340, the card sits in the same price segment as most competing GTX 970 cards, and it's also more expensive than other R9 390 variants which can be had for as little as $290. In my opinion, the card is a good alternative to the GTX 970, which broadens the choices users have as there is no clear winner. If you want to squeeze the maximum out of your budget, a used R9 290X could be an option as most of them sell for $100 less than the Nitro with only a few percentage points less performance. If you want a new card, however, the R9 390 is an excellent choice with a good price-to-performance ratio.