PowerColor Red Devil Radeon RX 580 8GB GDDR5 Review

NOISE AND TEMPERATURE

NOISE

Thanks to PowerColor’s Mute Fan technology, the fans on the Red Devil Radeon RX 580 don’t spin up until the GPU reaches a temperature of 60C. So for normal, non-gaming use, the card is silent, and even at low loads, the fans are nearly silent. With the fans stopped, our total system sound output hovered right around 45dB, but once the fans are running at full speed, which we encountered during nearly every one of our benchmarks, the Red Devil was quite the noisemaker, raising our system’s total sound output to 54dB.

TEMPERATURES

Our factory clocked settings presented us with an idle temperature of 49C, but when we bumped up to 1415Mhz, we saw a five degree idle increase to 54C. Once the dual 100mm fans kicked in at 60C under a load, the factory clocked temperatures reached 72C, with the overclocked speeds hitting 79C.

CONCLUSION

The PowerColor Red Devil Radeon RX 580 represents the high-end of AMD-based videocards currently available to consumers. The card comes overclocked from the factory with a boost clock of 1380Mhz, an increase of 40Mhz over stock-clocked cards. And while we weren’t able to achieve “Golden Sample” speeds, we did reach a stable boost clock of 1415Mhz, an increase of 35Mhz past the factory overclock, and 75Mhz over stock clocks. Our overclocking of the GDDR5 was quite successful as well, pushing from the stock speed of 2000Mhz, all the way up to 2250Mhz, for an effective 9000Mhz.

The build quality of the Red Devil is quite nice, with a metal, not plastic, shroud covering most of the card, and a nice aluminum backplate keeping the PCB from flexing. There is no RGB lighting to be found on the Red Devil, but a red LED-illuminated badge on the side of the card has a devilish glow to it. The two 100mm fans employ Mute Fan technology, which means they don’t start spinning until the GPU reaches 60C, however, once they get up to speed, the card becomes quite loud. Beneath the dual fan setup is a grouping of four heatpipes and their accompanying heatsinks.

Performance-wise, we ended up with results that were nothing but expected. We know that the RX 580 isn’t a truly high-end videocard when compared to offerings from NVIDIA, but for AMD fans, this is the best there is for the time being.

With AMD’s Vega launching soon, the RX 580 cards should start to come down in price, but the recent cryptocurrency mining craze has raised the prices and depleted stocks of nearly all modern videocards on both sides of the battlefield. This recent boom has led to price hikes across the board, with some cards going for more than double their MSRP. The PowerColor Red Devil Radeon RX 580 currently retails for $499 on Amazon, which is coming close to doubling the original MSRP of $270-$280.

If you can find a PowerColor Red Devil Radeon RX 580 for close to the original MSRP, and are looking to upgrade from a card more than two years old, we wouldn’t feel bad recommending it. However, with the current GPU mining craze, and with a Vega launch right around the corner, the price to performance ratio when it comes to gaming just doesn’t make sense. Of course, this isn’t PowerColor’s fault, and they probably benefit from selling as many cards as they can produce. That leaves PC enthusiasts looking to get a new videocard in a tough position of either paying more than they should for a new card, or holding out until prices drop.

In a world where pricing and availability were stable, the PowerColor Red Devil Radeon RX 580 would earn our value-related award for its price to performance ratio. Since that is not the case, we are awarding the PowerColor Red Devil Radeon RX 580 the Bjorn3D Seal of Approval, for providing competitive performance and great build quality throughout.

PowerColor Red Devil Radeon RX 580 Pros	PowerColor Red Devil Radeon RX 580 Cons
Great Build Quality Further Overclocking Headroom Mute Fan Technology 1.5mm Backplate Support for FreeSync, DX12, Vulkan, and HDR	Priced High Due To GPU Mining Low/No Availability Loud Under Full Load