There are indications that AMD has sent reviewers hand-picked Radeon R9 290 and 290X graphics boards that perform considerably better than the same boards purchased at retail, although AMD denies it. According to the reviews that have been currently online, AMD's latest R9 family of graphics processing units are offering considerable performance at a reasonable price-point with the flip-side of extreme heat they produce, mainly due to their cooler. However, Tom's Hardware claims that the high performance seen on its AMD-provided review sample isn't reflected when running the same benchmarks on retail hardware that has been purchased on online retailers. The web site's reviewing team found their R9 290 press board to be faster faster than an R9 290X bought in retail.

AMD's response came a little later but still, it is not so convincing:

"A media outlet has uniquely reported instances of AMD Radeon R9 290X boards purchased in retail that have exhibited an uncharacteristic level of performance variance as compared to press samples issued by AMD," the company said. "We're working to secure the board(s) in question for further analysis. Boards purchased by other media outlets have not exhibited similar characteristics that we're aware of. In the meantime, we've identified areas where variability can be minimized and are working on a driver update which will minimize this variance."