The Nvidia GeForce RTX 3090 Ti is a monstrous graphics card with an attention-grabbing story to inform. It’s the primary of its “Ti” form within the flagship “90” collection from Nvidia, maybe changing Titan-level GPUs of instances previous. It additionally nearly didn’t occur, having been delayed for months and releasing proper when graphics card costs began to quickly lower.
If the RTX 3090 Ti had a yearbook image, beneath would seemingly learn: “Most likely to be very, very expensive.” This beast carries a retail worth of $1999, and belief us, that is the primary time MSRP really meant one thing this misplaced GPU technology—you will discover these highly effective graphics playing cards available. Still, that’s a good bit greater than the vanilla GeForce RTX 3090’s already-steep $1499 sticker cost.
Seems like a nasty deal, proper? Not so quick. I’ve been utilizing EVGA’s hot-rodded GeForce RTX 3090 Ti FTW3 Ultra for the final a number of weeks, in addition to Nvidia’s RTX 3090 Ti Founders Edition, and found 5 key takeaways it is advisable to know.
Nvidia’s RTX 30-series finish recreation
The 3090 Ti maximizes the unique RTX 3090’s potential. Unlocking Nvidia’s full GA102 GPU offers it a minor bump in specs—barely extra ray tracing cores, a quicker base clock, and quicker GDDR6x reminiscence. This interprets to 5 to 10 p.c quicker efficiency than the RTX 3090, however in actual world use, it’s laborious to note a distinction even versus a GeForce RTX 3080 (which prices properly underneath half as a lot) in gaming.
That’s the primary perception from utilizing the RTX 3090 Ti: It’s a mixture of being extreme, overkill, and costly, whereas additionally being the quickest, most refined, and versatile GPU in Nvidia’s GeForce lineup. This is the overwhelming swan track for Nvidia’s Ampere structure.
Thiago Trevisan/Foundry
Picture this: A thick EVGA FTW3 3090 Ti smashing 4K frames on no matter recreation you throw at it whereas being imperceptibly quiet in your desk. Impressive The regular stream of warmth is sufficient to soften your ice cream, although.
Unfortunately, that will not be sufficient to hold it past only a footnote within the annals of GPU historical past.
Not for players? But it’s GeForce!
One factor I rapidly realized with this graphics card: Despite carrying the GeForce moniker, it’s massively overkill for gaming. It’s actually a hybrid GPU, because of its goliath 24GB of VRAM. This means it’s finest suited by content material creation, 3D rendering, and different skilled workflows.
Does the RTX 3090 Ti squeak out a number of extra frames than the $1199 GeForce RTX 3080 Ti? Sure, it does. But once you examine the value differential it rapidly turns into obvious that the latter is actually a way more smart choice, and at lots of of {dollars} cheaper. (You could make an argument that the faster 12GB version of the RTX 3080 can also be a candy spot GPU for high-end gaming at $999.)
When seen in a broader sense, the 3090 Ti is actually a workstation-level GPU that simply occurs to be the perfect at gaming. (We’ve heard of many professionals select the RTX 3090-series GPUs over typical Quadro Workstation choices since they supply higher worth.)
Be prepared for some…drawbacks
After you’ve drained your gold vault to pay for it, be prepared for extra challenges. You’ll want a beefy power supply to deal with the virtually 500W energy draw that an EVGA FTW3 3090 Ti will pull. Depending in your CPU selection, reminiscent of an Intel 12900KS or AMD Threadripper, a 1000W-plus energy provide wouldn’t be overkill.
You’ll additionally want a minimum of three 8-pin energy cables to tie into the customized 12-pin adapter that ships with the RTX 3090 Ti. This is typical with customized variations of higher-end GPUs, however this time even the Founders Edition wants extra cables. (The 3090 Founders Edition obtained away with simply two 8 pin cables!)
Powering the RTX 3090 Ti requires triple 8-pin connectors converging right into a single 12-pin adapter. It takes numerous juice.
Thiago Trevisan/Foundry
And with nice energy, comes nice warmth output. Thankfully the GPU itself might be superb, because of the extra-thick cooler on most 3090 Ti variants, just like the EVGA FTW3. But your different elements should cope with the great quantity of warmth popping out of your GPU. Case airflow and followers might be important to preserving your elements cool. This additionally interprets to needing ample room—these are cumbersome GPUs so that they sometimes gained’t slot in a mini-ITX case. Even mid-sized instances might be a battle with the 3.5 slot coolers!
The RTX 3090 Ti spits out unprecedented ranges of warmth, and it’s one thing that you simply solely recognize after utilizing it subsequent to you for weeks. (Make certain your air conditioner is able to go in the summertime, too!)
A glimpse into the following technology
The RTX 3090 Ti isn’t simply the final gasp of the RTX 30-series, but additionally a glimpse into the following technology of Nvidia graphics playing cards. We can seemingly count on energy draw to extend additional to provide us great efficiency sooner or later.
The customized EVGA RTX 3090 Ti FTW3 Ultra is noticably bigger than the already-beefy Nvidia Founders Edition.
Thiago Trevisan/Foundry
From utilizing the 3090 Ti, the very first thing that struck me was the outsized cooler designs. Typically, customized graphics card makers will use related coolers throughout totally different tiers of GPUs, with solely small variations between them, however the 3090 Ti FTW3 Ultra’s cooler is actually thicker than most would think about. That reveals that future cooler designs are broad open to “bulking up” even additional to deal with what is going to seemingly be ever rising cooling wants with better watts.
It’s really in inventory at MSRP
Perhaps some of the vital takeaways? The GeForce RTX 3090 Ti is the primary graphics card launch within the RTX 30-series that’s been available, and at MSRP.
Across the web on the day of the 3090 Ti’s launch, you possibly can simply discover a number of fashions out there for $1999, and even absolutely tricked-out customized variations just like the EVGA FTW3 or Asus Strix have been solely a $200 to $300 markup. By comparability, you’d pay an additional $500 to $800 (or extra!) for customized variations of the non-Ti RTX 3090 for a lot of its lifetime.
After years of chip shortages, the RTX 3090 Ti was launched firstly of the good GPU worth decline, with quickly reducing costs and rising provide. The $1499 RTX 3090 was by no means an awesome worth, because the RTX 3080 stole that limelight at $699. But at $1999, the RTX 3090 Ti is simply not a graphics card most individuals need because of the sky-high worth (regardless that it’s priced at or under the costs of many customized RTX 3090s on the present market).
Coupled with low crypto-miner demand, and the proximity to a perceived next-gen Nvidia launch later this yr, and it’s clear to see why the RTX 3090 Ti sells in such low numbers. It would have made sense within the hyper inflated market of 2021, the place even a lone RTX 3080 typically bought for practically $2000, however not now that we’re trending again to normalcy.