VisionTek Outs Liquid-Cooled, Overclocked CryoVenom R9 290 at CES 2014

What’s faster than Visiontek’s new Radeon R9 290? Not the 290X, according to the graphics card maker. VisionTek used CES to formally launch the CryoVenom, a liquid-cooled R9 290 that can be user-overclocked for a speed boost of (according to VisionTek), up to 24%. The card’s one-year warranty covers the overclocking, provided you stay within the speeds VisionTek rates it for, of course.


VisionTek says its CryoVenom R9 290, which retails for $550, has a GPU speed of 1175MHz and memory speed of 1450MHz, all while keeping temps low (125 degrees Fahrenheit in VistionTek’s tests). Those are higher frequencies than the stock R9 290X, which has GPU and memory speeds of 1000MHz and 1250MHz, respectively. We can’t speak to VisionTek’s performance claims without having tested the card yet, but it’s intriguing, especially if you already have a liquid-cooling system in place and would like to save some money by going with the CryoVenom R9 290 instead of a much more expensive liquid-cooled R9 290X (air-cooled cards are priced higher than the CryoVenom at the moment as well).