If you’ve been following the GPU market these previous couple of years, it’s been a wild trip. But now that we’re on the tail finish of an enormous spike in GPU costs, Nvidia is ready to launch its subsequent massive flagship GPU, the RTX 4090.
Details and leaks concerning the upcoming 40-series have been all the place, with some excessive rumors about energy consumption and worth. Either manner, it’s more likely to take a spot among the many strongest GPUs you should purchase. We don’t know what all will find yourself being true, however right here’s all the pieces we’ve heard thus far.
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Release date
We received’t know any of the ultimate particulars or pricing till Nvidia formally launches the RTX 4090. But we do know that Nvidia historically drops new graphics playing cards each two years within the fall, which makes someday between mid-September and the top of October the most definitely state of affairs.
The final time round was within the peak of a worldwide well being and provide disaster. While issues are undoubtedly chaotic this 12 months, chip provide chains, not less than, are in a lot better form than they have been in 2020. This means the RTX 4090 might get into customers’ arms a lot sooner than the RTX 3090.
To add extra assist to an upcoming fall launch, Nvidia leaked a testing schedule again in late May and included August and September for mass manufacturing of the unit.
Igor’s Lab
Of course, this might nonetheless be off. After all, a rumor again in May pegged the RTX 4090 launch date for mid-July. Obviously, this didn’t occur, and it doesn’t match with Nvidia’s customary fall launch.
On the opposite hand, it’s doable we might see Nvidia delay the occasion into early 2023. The purpose is straightforward: They have too many RTX 3000-series chips readily available. Logistics bottlenecks through the pandemic meant chips piled up in warehouses, and Nvidia could hope to dump some extra of those 2020 GPUs earlier than dumping a brand new model onto the market.
Right now, rumors are suggesting that Nvidia will launch solely the RTX 4090 and maintain off on the mid-range 4000-series playing cards whereas they offload surplus inventory. This would assist carry down pricing on older, however nonetheless succesful. chips, and put them extra in keeping with AMD chips.
Price
The present RTX 3090, arguably the king of graphics playing cards proper now, dropped from a excessive of $1,999 and has settled round $1,499. The RTX 4090 will in all probability find yourself north of that quantity, though we are able to’t see it reaching $2,000 territory.
Pricing is necessary proper now, particularly with AMD snipping at Nvidia’s heels. The AMD Radeon RX 7000 sequence of GPUs promise to be beasts as effectively, however at a cheaper price. The current-gen AMD Radeon RX 6900 XT retails for $900, or $500 lower than the present Nvidia RTX 3090 Ti. Nvidia’s latest monetary woes within the gaming sphere might even immediate Nvidia to get extra aggressive with pricing, however we’ll have to attend and see.
Architecture rumors
According to the rumors, the Nvidia RTX 4090 will most definitely embody 16,384 CUDA cores, 144 ray tracing cores, and 576 tensor cores. Potentially, this might give it a scorching 40% efficiency enhance over the RTX 3090.
It may even embody 24GB of VRAM, the identical because the 3090. However, Twitter leaker Kopite7kimi says the RTX 4090 may have a base clock velocity of 2235 MHz and might enhance as much as 2520 MHz, greater than double that of the RTX 3090.

RTX 4090
RTX 3090

CUDA Cores
16,384
10,496

Ray tracing cores
144
82

Tensor cores
576
328

VRAM GDDR6X
24GB
24GB

Base clock velocity
2235 MHz
1394 MHz

Boost clock velocity
2520 MHz
1695 MHz

Bus width
384 width
384 width

Power draw
If rumors are to be believed, the RTX 4090 will likely be a power-chewing monster with an unquenchable urge for food for electrical energy. Put extra succinctly, it is going to require as much as 600 watts of energy when pushed to its most. With the way in which some are already downclocking their GPUs to maintain warmth and noise down, this quantity of energy could possibly be an issue.
Although it is going to include an ordinary 12-pin PCIe Gen 5 energy connector, likelihood is there’ll must be some type of adapter with a view to draw that type of energy. It could possibly be in-built or could must be bought individually. Nvidia normally doesn’t nickel-and-dime customers, so we don’t see the latter being seemingly.
Still, 600 watts is lots of energy. The previous-gen RTX 3090 gulps as much as 385 watts, which is rather a lot. The RTX 4090 will transfer sufficient vitality to warmth your own home, which means it’ll be past time to improve your energy provide.
Jacob Roach / Digital Trends
According to tech watchdog Igor’s Lab, the RTX 4090 will want 450 watts simply to energy the GPU. The VRAM, followers, inductor, caps, and MOSFET will want the remaining.
Because of this large want for energy, the RTX 4090 will get scorching. We’re speaking “surface of the sun” ranges of warmth — sufficient to soften the unit below sustained load. It would require an enormous cooling unit to maintain temperatures below management.
We reported on simply such a factor again in June. The RTX 4090 has a three-slot BFGPU cooler very like the RTX 3090 Ti, however with extra fins and extra warmth sink floor. It will seemingly preserve the identical twin flow-through because the RTX 3090, and the brand will mild up LED lights.
Performance
Power doesn’t essentially translate into efficiency, however the RTX 4090 must discover a technique to convert that vitality into pure graphical achievement. There’s no denying that high-end Nvidia GPUs are among the many greatest on the planet, even when they’re overpriced and laborious to get. But the RTX 4090 might find yourself being on a unique stage altogether.
For starters, the cardboard will supposedly be capable of obtain a rating of 19,000 on a Time Spy Extreme benchmark check, in line with kopite7kimi. This would make it the quickest GPU ever constructed and almost double the RTX 3090’s rating of 10,000. Other rumors recommend the RTX 4090 can hit 4K 160 fps with each ray tracing and DLSS enabled. Gamers are going to like this card, if these rumors show right.
But extra stunning is the uncooked efficiency. The RTX 4090 is ready to grow to be the primary GPU to interrupt the 100 teraflops bar. These are actually phenomenal numbers, however let’s be actual: This is an fanatic card solely. Performance akin to this sits on the perimeters of client wants.
Gamers will be capable of play Cyberpunk 2077 or Elden Ring at full settings. The solely drawback could possibly be what your electrical energy invoice will appear to be afterward.

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