NVIDIA Reveals GeForce RTX 3080 TI And 3070 Ti, Raises Bar On High Performance PC Gaming
NVIDIA describes the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti as "The new flagship gaming GPU of the GeForce RTX family," although we wonder where this leaves the GeForce RTX 3090. As such, the official specs match what's been roaming around in the recent rumor mill. That means 10,240 CUDA cores, 80 RT cores, 320 texture units, and 112 ROPs. NVIDIA is quoting a maximum boost clock of 1665MHz along with 12GB of 19Gbps GDDR6X memory on a 384-but bus (912GB/sec memory bandwidth). Total Graphics Power (TGP) for the board is rated at 350 watts.
Except for the memory loadout, these specs put the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti closer to the GeForce RTX 3090 than the preceding GeForce RTX 3080. Overall, the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti is 50 percent faster than the GeForce RTX 2080 and twice as fast as the GeForce GTX 1080
"With RTX such a huge success, gamers and creators will be thrilled with performance and features the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti offers," said Jeff Fisher, SVP of NVIDIA's GeForce unit. "As the new flagship to the RTX family, the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti is the ultimate upgrade for GPU enthusiasts of any generation."
Unfortunately, all that performance comes at a hefty cost. The GeForce RTX 3080 comes priced at $699, which had some hoping that the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti would launch at $999. However, that isn't the case as the card is instead priced at $1,199, making it just $300 less than the GeForce RTX 3090. We shouldn't be too surprised given that its performance should put it more in GeForce RTX 3090 territory.
However, those prices are only applicable if, and that's a big IF, you can actually obtain a GeForce RTX 3080 Ti. It's already nearly impossible to find an existing GeForce RTX 30 Series graphics card in stock at MSRP, and it won't get any easier with the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti. The street prices for the GeForce RTX 3090 are currently hovering around $3,000 to $4,000. We'd imagine that the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti will have similar pricing on 3rd party marketplaces given its performance potential.
NVIDIA says that the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti will go on sale on June 3rd, and it will be available -- in limited quantities -- as first-party Founders Edition boards. However, most people will get their hands on custom boards in stock and factory-overclocked versions from the usual suspects like ASUS, Gigabyte, MSI, and EVGA (among others).
GeForce RTX 3070 Ti Is Inbound Soon - Update: 6/1/21 9:25 AM
NVIDIA also announced that the GeForce RTX 3070 Ti would launch on June 10th, but it hasn't given us any information on specifications (although it is claimed to be 1.5x faster than the GeForce RTX 2070 Super). We did just spot that EVGA notes on its website that the RTX 3070 Ti "features double the I/O data rate compared to the GeForce RTX 3070," which would suggest the rumors of it being strapped with faster GDDR6X memory are indeed true. Finally, NVIDIA did providing pricing, which comes in at $599 (right in the middle of the existing $499 GeForce RTX 3070 and $699 GeForce RTX 3080). Stay tuned for more details on both the RTX 3080 Ti and RTX 3070 Ti in the days ahead, and for our full review of course.
