AMD Radeon R9 M390X vs NVIDIA Quadro K5200 Comparison

AMD Radeon R9 M390X and NVIDIA Quadro K5200 represent two very different design philosophies from the same 28 nm era, and the benchmark data clearly separates them. The most striking result is in the shared Geekbench Vulkan test, where the NVIDIA Quadro K5200 delivers a score of 20,180 against the AMD Radeon R9 M390X’s 16,951. That is a 16% advantage for the Quadro, a decisive margin that flips the expected narrative for a mobile gaming chip versus a professional workstation card. The AMD part, however, counters with a higher average benchmark score of 20,662 versus 19,602 for the NVIDIA card, a 5.4% lead that reflects its strength in broader compute workloads. These two cards are close in overall standing—the R9 M390X sits at the 66th percentile of all GPUs while the K5200 sits at the 64th—but their individual strengths land in different arenas.

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The only direct head-to-head benchmark available is Geekbench Vulkan, and it is a clear win for the NVIDIA Quadro K5200. The K5200 scores 20,180, while the R9 M390X manages 16,951, giving the NVIDIA card a 16% edge in this API. Vulkan is a low-level graphics API that rewards raw hardware throughput and driver efficiency, and the data shows the Kepler-based Quadro handling it substantially better than the GCN 3.0 mobile chip. This is not a marginal difference; it is a gap large enough to change the character of a workload. For any application that leans on Vulkan for rendering or compute, the K5200 is the stronger pick by a wide margin.

Looking beyond the single shared test, the average benchmark scores paint a more nuanced picture. The R9 M390X averages 20,662 across its benchmark suite, which places it just 0.2% behind the AMD Radeon RX 5600 XT (20,713) and 0.4% ahead of the Intel Arc A750 (20,582). That puts the mobile AMD chip in the company of modern desktop cards, which is remarkable given its 75 W TDP. The Quadro K5200, by contrast, averages 19,602, sitting 0.2% ahead of the AMD FirePro D300 (19,637) and 0.8% behind the AMD Radeon RX 6650 XT (19,765). Its nearest rivals also include the AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX at 19,410 (1% behind the K5200) and the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 3 GB at 19,334 (1.4% behind). So while the K5200 wins the Vulkan matchup, the R9 M390X holds a higher average score overall, indicating better performance across a wider set of tests.

The deltaPct values in the rivals list are telling. The R9 M390X’s closest rival, the RX 5600 XT, is only 0.2% faster, which means the AMD mobile chip is essentially trading blows with a desktop card from a much later generation. The Quadro K5200’s closest rival, the FirePro D300, is 0.2% slower, showing that the K5200 sits right at the edge of its performance tier. When you compare the two directly through their averages, the R9 M390X leads by 1,060 points, or roughly 5.4%. That is a meaningful gap in aggregate compute performance, even though the K5200 wins the one test where they face off directly.

FAQ

Q: Which GPU wins the direct Vulkan benchmark between the R9 M390X and the K5200?

A: The NVIDIA Quadro K5200 wins decisively, scoring 20,180 against the AMD Radeon R9 M390X’s 16,951, a 16% advantage for the NVIDIA card.

Q: How do the two cards compare in overall average benchmark score?

A: The AMD Radeon R9 M390X posts a higher average score of 20,662, while the NVIDIA Quadro K5200 averages 19,602. That gives the AMD card a lead of about 5.4% across the aggregate benchmarks.

Q: Where does each card sit in the overall GPU percentile ranking?

A: The R9 M390X ranks in the 66th percentile of all GPUs, while the K5200 sits in the 64th percentile. Despite the K5200’s Vulkan win, the R9 M390X has a slightly higher overall standing.

Q: What are the closest rivals to each card based on average score?

A: For the R9 M390X, the closest rival is the AMD Radeon RX 5600 XT at 20,713 (0.2% faster), followed by the Intel Arc A750 at 20,582 (0.4% slower). For the K5200, the closest rival is the AMD FirePro D300 at 19,637 (0.2% slower), with the AMD Radeon RX 6650 XT at 19,765 (0.8% faster) close behind.

Q: Which card has a higher memory bandwidth?

A: The NVIDIA Quadro K5200 has a higher memory bandwidth at 192.3 GB/s, compared to the AMD Radeon R9 M390X’s 160.0 GB/s. Both use a 256-bit bus, but the K5200 runs its GDDR5 memory at 6 Gbps effective versus 5 Gbps effective on the R9 M390X.

Q: Does either card support DirectX 12 at feature level 12_0?

A: Only the AMD Radeon R9 M390X supports DirectX 12 (12_0). The NVIDIA Quadro K5200 is limited to DirectX 12 (11_1), a lower feature level that may restrict certain modern rendering features.

The Verdict

The data points to a clear split in use cases. The AMD Radeon R9 M390X is the better choice for anyone prioritizing aggregate compute performance, as its 20,662 average score tops the K5200’s 19,602 by a notable margin. Its higher percentile ranking (66th versus 64th) and its position amid modern desktop rivals like the RX 5600 XT and Arc A750 reinforce that it is the more capable all-rounder in synthetic benchmarks. The R9 M390X also delivers this performance at a 75 W TDP, which is half the 150 W draw of the K5200, making it far more efficient for a mobile form factor. For gaming-style workloads or general compute that spans multiple APIs, the AMD card’s higher average score and DirectX 12 (12_0) support give it the edge.

The NVIDIA Quadro K5200, however, is the definitive winner in Vulkan-specific tasks. Its 20,180 Vulkan score against 16,951 for the R9 M390X is a 16% gap that cannot be ignored. If your workflow is heavily reliant on Vulkan—whether for professional rendering, compute, or specific game engines—the K5200 is the superior choice despite its lower average score. The K5200 also offers double the memory (8 GB versus 4 GB) and higher memory bandwidth (192.3 GB/s versus 160.0 GB/s), which matters for large datasets and high-resolution textures. Its nearest rivals, such as the RX 6650 XT and GTX 1060 3 GB, show that it holds its own in the professional tier, even if it lacks the R9 M390X’s overall average.

For a purely data-driven recommendation: pick the R9 M390X if you want the higher average benchmark performance and lower power draw. Pick the K5200 if Vulkan performance and memory capacity are your primary concerns. The K5200’s dual-slot design, 267 mm length, and 150 W TDP also make it a desktop-oriented card, while the R9 M390X is an MXM module built for portables. The K5200’s 6-pin power connector and 450 W suggested PSU further cement its workstation role, whereas the R9 M390X needs no external power. Neither card is current; both are end-of-life, but the benchmark numbers show they still have distinct, non-overlapping strengths.

Specification Differences

The most obvious difference is form factor and power. The AMD Radeon R9 M390X is an MXM module with a 75 W TDP and no power connectors, designed for laptops and portable devices. The NVIDIA Quadro K5200 is a dual-slot desktop card measuring 267 mm in length and 111 mm in height, with a 150 W TDP, a single 6-pin power connector, and a suggested 450 W power supply. Memory capacity also differs sharply: the R9 M390X has 4 GB of GDDR5, while the K5200 doubles that to 8 GB. Both use a 256-bit bus, but the K5200’s memory runs at 6 Gbps effective (1502 MHz) versus 5 Gbps effective (1250 MHz) on the R9 M390X, resulting in 192.3 GB/s of bandwidth for the K5200 versus 160.0 GB/s for the AMD card.

Clock speeds are another differentiator. The K5200 has defined base and boost clocks of 667 MHz and 771 MHz, while the R9 M390X has no listed base or boost clocks, only its memory clock. The K5200 also has more shading units (2,304 versus 2,048), more texture mapping units (192 versus 128), and more raster operation units (48 versus 32). This translates to higher pixel and texture rates for the K5200: 37.01 GPixel/s versus 23.14 GPixel/s, and 148.0 GTexel/s versus 92.54 GTexel/s. The K5200 also leads in FP32 compute at 3.553 TFLOPS versus 2.961 TFLOPS for the R9 M390X. The R9 M390X does have FP16 capability at 2.961 TFLOPS (1:1), while the K5200 has no FP16 data listed.

Display outputs separate them as well: the R9 M390X is portable-device dependent, while the K5200 offers 2x DVI and 2x DisplayPort 1.2. API support also differs, with the R9 M390X supporting DirectX 12 (12_0) and Vulkan 1.2.170, while the K5200 only reaches DirectX 12 (11_1) but has a slightly newer Vulkan 1.2.175. Release dates are close, with the R9 M390X launching on May 4, 2015, and the K5200 on July 21, 2014.

Architecture Differences

The two cards come from fundamentally different architectural lineages. The AMD Radeon R9 M390X is built on GCN 3.0, fabricated by TSMC on a 28 nm process. Its chip is codenamed Amethyst, part of the Gem System generation (R9 M300 series). It packs 5,000 million transistors on a 366 mm² die, yielding a transistor density of 13.7M per mm². The GCN 3.0 architecture is a mature compute-oriented design that scales well across a range of workloads, as evidenced by its competitive average benchmark score.

The NVIDIA Quadro K5200 uses the Kepler architecture, specifically the GK110B chip, also on a 28 nm TSMC process. It is part of the Quadro Kepler generation (Kx200). The GK110B is a much larger die at 561 mm², housing 7,080 million transistors, which gives it a slightly lower transistor density of 12.6M per mm². The larger die and higher transistor count explain the K5200’s higher raw throughput in pixel rate, texture rate, and FP32 compute, despite its lower clock speeds.

The architectural divergence is also visible in feature support. GCN 3.0 natively supports FP16 compute at a 1:1 ratio with FP32, which is absent from the K5200’s Kepler design. The R9 M390X also supports DirectX 12_0, while Kepler only reaches 11_1. However, the K5200 has a newer Vulkan version (1.2.175 versus 1.2.170), which may contribute to its strong Vulkan benchmark showing. The K5200’s Kepler architecture, with its 2,304 shading units and 192 TMUs, is built for high-throughput professional workloads, while the R9 M390X’s GCN 3.0 design, with 2,048 shaders and 128 TMUs, is more balanced for mobile efficiency. The R9 M390X’s predecessor is the Solar System series, with Polaris Mobile as its successor, while the K5200 follows Quadro Fermi and precedes Quadro Maxwell. These architectural roots explain why the K5200 wins in Vulkan but loses in aggregate average score.