Sort of AMD news for the gamers...
It turns out I bought a Powercolor R9 290 for my brother without thinking much of it, only to be impressed by the performance of the Hawaii chip and the quality of the card build. I would very likely take it over, say, a Zotac or an EVGA GTX 970 (I still have an undying affection for my mini Gigabyte GTX 970 haha). So, if anyone is interested on budget GTX 970 quality, serioulsy consider going for the Turboduo R9 290. It's only $249 on Newegg.
I mean, a quick trip around Google would have you believe Powercolor and the 290 cards are crap. Not quite!
(Of course, I might have been lucky, after all. But I don't think so. The Turboduo cards are using a late bath of Hawaii chips and they are more likely to be reliable.)