Here's why AMD let's the 290 run so hot.

[final kaoss]

Discuss?

Q. What is a single tech that AMD is currently working on that you don't feel there is enough buzz about?
Something possibly overlooked or overshadowed but to which we should really be paying attention?

A. My favorite is the new implementation of PowerTune on the 290X and 290. There's a lot of doom and gloom around the 95C temperature,
because people are used to a world where the product is designed to run as cold as possible... but that's not the world we're living in with these units.
The doom and gloom is based on an old viewpoint.

95C is the optimal temperature that allows the board to convert its power consumption into meaningful performance for the user.
Every single component on the board is designed to run at that temperature throughout the lifetime of the product.
If you throttle the temperature down below that threshold, then the board must in turn consume less power to respect the new temperature limit.
Consuming less power means lowering vcore and engine clock, which means less performance.

You want to take full advantage of product TDP to maximize performance, and that is accomplished with a 95C ideal operating temperature for the 290 and 290X.
Even with a third-party cooling solution, like the Accelero 3 some users have started deploying, the logic of PowerTune will still try to maximize TDP
by allowing temperatures to float higher until some other limit is met (voltage, clock, fan RPM, whatever). It's so bloody smart and it kills me that more people don't fully understand it.

[setishock]

AMD's run a lot warmer than Intel as a rule and have a history of blowing up if not properly cooled. Intel on the other hand has built in thermal over heat protection. If it gets too hot it throttles back and if it continues to stay hot it will send a soft shut down command to the motherboard.
I build my own systems and I've had a couple of AMD based. After finding one of my AMD rigs sitting in a cloud of blue smoke from thermal runaway, I won't have another.