Question 1

This card has 3 power connector slots. 2x 8-pins and 1x 6-pin.

My power supply only has 2x 8 pin connector cables for the GPU, but 2 additional slots for more power cables are located on the power supply unit.

What 6-pin  cable do I buy that connects from the power supply to the videocard?

Accepted Answer

I assume you  have a modular power supply and are looking for the correct cable to go from it to the 6 pin pci-e power input on the Lightning.   You have to be careful about that because the pinouts can be different , even on different models of the same brand of power supply.  You could try contacting the manufacturer of the power supply and see if they could give you a replacement etc. 
Whatever  you do, not just slap a cable that fits the plug in  on the psu and expect it to be correct. Good luck, the lightning is one heck of a card :)

Question 2

Does this card come with DVI-D cables, or do those have to be bought seperately?

Accepted Answer

No, dvi-d cables come with your monitor. They only come with 120hz monitors or higher or you can purchase them separately.

Question 3

What are the minimum power requirements for this card? Can it run on a 750W EVGA G2 or should a power supply upgrade to an 850W or 1KW be in order to run this PSU?

Accepted Answer

750W will be fine.  What I don't know however is if the EVGA 750 G2 has two 8-pin power connectors that the R290x requires for full power mode.  See the pictures of the top of the R290x on this site and you will see 2-8-pin and 1-6-pin connectors.  You need the dual 8-pins to power correctly.

Question 4

how much power will i need to run 2 of these cards?

AMD FX-9370

ASUS M5A99FX PRO 2.0

8GB ballistix DDR3 1866

crucil MX 100 ssd

1200 watt psu

Accepted Answer

Im running a 650 with trident 8gb x2 asus m5a97 r 2.0 amd 8350 vishera samsung 840 evo ssd and im estimating 540 watts so im sure ur 1200 psu will exceed and give enough for a 2nd lightning. I was thinking for 2 gpus as well but i was convinced not to since the performance is just a little better vs just one just my 2 cents :) good luck

Question 5

Why is this 290x $30-50 more than MSI GTX 970?

Accepted Answer

well there's a extra fan. There's more bits. Option for more monitors. Power requirements are higher though. ( Got that off of the MSI website ) Also the 290X Lightning is supposed to be military grade and has a metal bar to help prevent sagging/bending, and it has a certificate of a few different things... don't remember what though. but personally I like this card, I think it was a good buy.

Question 6

If i crossfire this with a reference version, which is a tad slower i think, will i be limiting the performance of this card?

Accepted Answer

No, your over clock may not be as good but you'll still see huge improvement to performance. I'd get an 8gb card because using two does not combine cram. But if you get an 8gb you'd be set for high red in pair with a lightning! If not you'll still have great power with two 4gb cards! You can mix and match 290s, 290x and 295x2 cards! Amd is awesome in that regard :)

Question 7

Has anyone had any driver issues with single card and crossfire?  I have owned amd cards in the past and am nervous to purchase because of drivers.  I play BF4 and Diablo 3.

Accepted Answer

Hi, 
Before you do Crossfire, you should check out if the game scales great on crossfire. some games are not optimized to work on crossfire but are great on single cards.

This version of R9 290X has catalyst version 14.1-14.3 bug because it has different PWM control so you won't see the Fan speed on CCC and AB monitoring software.

CCC 13.12 is stable for this product. No bugs encountered.

I was not sure if at 14.4 onwards if the PWM bug is addressed but there are articles that you need to flash a new bios for this guy in order for CCC 14.1 onwards won't have the PWM bug.

Question 8

Will this card fit on a ASRock Z97 Extreme3 ATX LGA1150 Motherboard inside of a Corsair 200R ATX Mid Tower Case? Will any drive bays be blocked?

Accepted Answer

Can't say for certain the hard drive bays won't get in the way. However, they're almost always removable. This is a VERY long card. But looking at the dimensions I wouldn't worry too much just make sure you can remove those lower hard drive bays. If not, then yeah it may not fit.

Question 9

Live update 6 wont let me download the new bios, where can I get it at?

Accepted Answer

new bios for fixing the pwm issue for 14.4 and up drivers???
Try uninstalling Live Update and Reinstalling it.. Restart before installing the new live update.

Also, There are also forums out there, specially on MSI Forums which gives out it's bios. although if you are unsuccessful on flashing the bios they gave it may brick the video card.

Mine, I sticked to 13.12 there is performance issue on my drivers or games that are lagging already.

Question 10

Is this card 3 Way Crossfire Compatible?

Accepted Answer

Up to 4 Way Crossfire Sir as stated by MSI.

Just take note of power Consumption.

You should have a very efficient and reliable PSU to run it on 4 way Crossfire.

Also, to maximize Framerates, don't let your CPU bottle neck it.

Make sure you got ebough PCI-E lanes to support it.

It's an expensive card... and really does deserve an expensive system to make full potential of it

Questions & Answers