Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 Ti Founders Edition Graphics Card Review – The Must Have Flagship Gaming GPU

Introduction

The Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 Ti and GeForce RTX 3070 Ti is Nvidia’s traditional 1-year refresh of its current generation cards as the ampere architecture reaches 1 year. However, unlike the previous RTX 20 series GPUs, the new models this time around have a “Ti” moniker instead of the super branding. Both graphics card fills in the gaps in terms of pricing in Nvidia’s current RTX 30 series lineup allowing gamers to have more options to choose from starting with the base RTX 3060 priced at $399 all the way to the RTX 3090 at $1,499. Nvidia’s decision to release Ti models of 3080 and 3070 could also because of AMD’s current RX 6000 series GPUs particularly the RX 6900 XT and RX 6800 XT which sit at the same price range as the RTX 3080 Ti and RTX 3070 Ti, respectively. That said, the RTX 3080 Ti looks to be the more intriguing card as it’s priced $400 more than the 3080 but is also $300 lower than the flagship RTX 3090.

Note: This review shares some parts with the Inno3D GeForce RTX 3080 Ti Graphics Card Review article as it was our first RTX 3080 Ti. Skip to Page 2 if you already read the Inno3D RTX 3080 Ti review.

Ampere Architecture

The latest Ampere Architecture features 2nd Generation RT Cores and 3rd Generation Tensor cores that double the performance compared to last generation’s Turing architecture as well as bringing in new and improved features such as Ray Tracing, DLSS 2.0, Nvidia Broadcast, Reflex, and many more.

Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 Ti

The Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 Ti sits in between the RTX 3080 and RTX 3090 both in terms of specs and pricing. Nvidia’s Computex 2021 Keynote announcement highlighted that the RTX 3080 Ti’s performance is 1.5 times faster than the previous flagship, RTX 2080 Ti which essentially has the same launch price of $1,119.

Specs-wise, the RTX 3080 Ti has 17% more CUDA, Tensor, and RT cores than the RTX 3080 non-Ti while it has 3% fewer overall cores than the flagship RTX 3090. Based on paper, the RTX 3080 Ti with 3% lesser cores looks to be a good deal over the RTX 3090 since the former is 20% cheaper at $300. That said, having 17% more cores than the RTX 3080 doesn’t seem to justify the 50% price increase. When we take into account AMD Radeon GPUs, the RTX 3080 Ti is priced $200 more than the RX 6900 XT, which in some benchmarks, can keep up with the RX 6900 XT so long as Ray Tracing isn’t involved. That said, the RTX 3080 Ti is in a relatively tough spot as it’s sandwiched by flagship GPUs by both teams red and green.

Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 Ti FE – A Closer Look

The Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 Ti Founders Edition retains the same signature Founders Edition packaging as seen on the RTX 3080 and RTX 3090. The back part shows key specifications and warranty information that’s printed in different languages.

Like the rest of the RTX 30 series Founders Edition variants, the RTX 3080 Ti Founders Edition uses a different shade for its highlights. The RTX 3080 Ti Founders Edition color hue is a mix of the RTX 3080 FE and RTX 3090 with a shiny finish for its chamfered edges.

The back part of the RTX 3080 Ti Founders Edition color hue draws closer to the RTX 3090 with a bronze-like finish.

Surprisingly, the RTX 3080 Ti has a thin 2-slot cooler design compared to the 3-slot behemoth on the RTX 3090.

The RTX 3080 Ti has a rated TGP of 320W thus requiring two-8pin PCI-E connectors for its 12-pin microfit cable. Its TGP is only 30-watts less than the RTX 3090 which has double the amount of GDDR6X VRAM and 5-percent more overall cores. Nvidia recommends at least a 750-watt power supply for the RTX 3080 Ti.

The same standard video port layout can be found on the RTX 3080 Ti – Three Display Port 1.4a ports and one HDMI 2.1 port.

The Nvidia RTX 3080 Ti’ Founders Editions GeForce RTX logo lights up just like the RTX 3080 and RTX 3090.

Benchmark Setup and Methodology

Gadget Pilipinas’ testing philosophy is to provide detail-oriented results as accurately as possible that our readers can replicate our tests given that these conditions are met. Different benchmarking apps and sequences are used depending on the component or device being tested.

We use CapFrameX 1.6.3 as our FPS capture and analysis tool for all our gaming benchmarks. The latest build version of Windows 10 and WHQL certified drivers are used for our benchmarks. Readings such as temperatures and power draw are recorded using HWMonitor and HWInfo64 as well as other relevant software are used for cross-checking.

Our benchmark list and methodology may change in the future depending on the industry trend.

Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 Ti FE – Synthetic Benchmarks

3DMARK

3DMark is the go-to benchmark for gamers because of the ability to share and compare results online. We tested the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070 Ti FE  both in Fire Strike and Time Spy to get a good gauge of DX 11 and DX 12 API performance. We also tested the GPUs in Port Royal, 3DMark’s DX12 Ray Tracing benchmark.

GeekBench 5

Geekbench is a multi-platform benchmark that’s used to gauge CPU performance and compare them across Windows, Mac, and Mobile. Geekbench 5 is the latest version and doesn’t rely on memory as much compared to the previous Geekbench 4, making it a great tool to measure both single-core and multi-core CPU performance. For our GPU reviews, we both measure OpenCL and Vulkan performance

VRAY

V-Ray Benchmark is a stand-alone version of V-Ray developed by Chaos Group. It is designed to test the CPU and GPU by rendering sample scenes at a fixed amount of time. V-Ray is a plug-in mostly utilized by 3D computer graphics software applications mainly for industrial design, product design, architecture, film, and video game production. V-Ray is not limited to 64-threads as it supports multi and mega-threading.

Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070 Ti FE – Gaming Benchmarks

DOTA 2

Most gamers play at least one of the following free-to-play titles: League of Legends, CS: GO, Dota 2, and/or Fortnite. Dota 2 is a good representation of the F2P titles as it is the most demanding game in the spectrum. The benchmark will give you an idea of the graphic card’s relative performance on other lesser demanding titles. Our benchmark sequence is based on a replay of OG vs. Liquid in the TI9 grand finals from the team fight that happened from 28:30 to 29:30.

Far Cry 5

FarCry 5 is an FPS game published by Ubisoft and uses the Dunia engine. It heavily relies on and takes advantage of DirectX 11 to render a realistic environment that makes it taxing to both the CPU and GPU.

Rainbow Six Siege

Rainbow Six Seige is one of the few popular AAA games that’s still popular in 2021 due to its competitive gameplay mechanics. R6S uses the AnvilNext game engine, which is developed by the game’s publisher, Ubisoft. As of writing, Rainbow Six Siege is currently the most popular Tom Clancy title beating out Wildlands, Breakpoint and even, Division 2. Rainbow Six Seige is one of the few popular AAA games that’s still popular in 2019 due to its competitive gameplay mechanics. R6S uses the AnvilNext game engine, which is developed by the game’s publisher, Ubisoft. As of writing, Rainbow Six Siege is currently the most popular Tom Clancy title beating out Wildlands, Breakpoint and even, Division 2.

Cyberpunk 2077

Cyberpunk 2077 is arguably the most hyped game of 2020. Developed by CD Projekt Red, the dystopian open-world, action-adventure RPG sports is one of the most demanding titles to date. Cyberpunk 2077 also supports three Ray Tracing settings as well as DLSS which makes the game a great tool to measure Ray tracing performance for both AMD and Nvidia graphics cards.

Shadow of The Tomb Raider

Shadow of The Tomb Raider or SOTR is the latest installment of the Lara Croft Tomb Raider franchise. Developed by Square Enix, SOTR uses the Foundation engine and is further enhanced by Eidos Montreal. STOR is also one of the first games to come out with Ray Tracing and DLSS support.

Metro Exodus

Metro Exodus is the third Metro game trilogy based on Dmitry Glukhovsky’s novels. The game is a first-person shooter with survival horror and stealth elements. The post-apocalyptic game is using 4A Engine by 4A games. Released last 2019, Metro Exodus remains to be one of the most graphically pleasing and demanding games that’s popular to date.

Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey

Assassin’s Creed Odyssey is the latest franchise installment from Ubisoft. It’s by far the most popular and stable Assassin’s Creed title since AC IV: Black Flag. It uses the AnvilNext 2.0 game engine, an updated version of Rainbow Six Siege’s game engine, and uses the DirectX 12 API.

F1 2020

F1 2020 is the official video game of the 2020 Formula 1 and Formula 2 championships developed by Codemasters. F1 2020 is the twelfth installment in the franchise and uses the Ego Engine 3.0. F1 2020 is a good representation of racing games thanks to its realistic graphics and fairly demanding spec requirements.

GODFALL

Horizon Zero Dawn is one of the most popular console-port RPG developed by Guerilla Games and published by Sony Interactive Entertainment. Horizon Zero Dawn is a multi-award-winning action RPG and its popularity resulted in an exclusive Complete Edition game bundle in Steam.

Performance Summary

Against the aftermarket Inno3D RTX 3080 Ti iChill X4, Nvidia’s very own RTX 3080 Ti Founders Edition trails behind at around 4% at 1080p and closes the gap to 3% and 2.3% once we bump up the resolution to 1440p and 4K. The Founders Edition variant manages to hold up on its own especially in terms of frame rate stability as represented by the 5% and 1% FPS numbers.

Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 Ti FE – Ray Tracing Benchmarks

3DMark

Cyberpunk 2077

Shadow of The Tomb Raider

Metro Exodus

Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 Ti FE – Temps and Power Draw

The Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 Ti, despite having a thinner cooler manages to peak at only 77°C while having the second-lowest idle temperature at 27.7°C next to the newly launched RTX 3070 Ti with a 0.9°C difference. It’s impressive to see the effectiveness of Nvidia’s flow-through cooler design, especially when compared to the three-slot, four-fan cooler on Inno3D’s iChill X4 variant. That said, it is worth nothing that the RTX 3080 Ti iChill X4 is an OC model which is also impressive on its own considering both temps and performance.

Our maximum recorded power draw via HWINFOx64 peaked at 349.808 watts for the RTX 3080 Ti Founders Edition which is surprisingly more than the Inno3D iChill x4 OC model variant. The difference in power consumption can be attributed to either margin of error or the way on how these RTX 3080 Ti GPUs or HWINFOx64 report the wattages.

Conclusion

Like our previous Inno3D RTX 3080 Ti iChill X4 review, we’ll have separate conclusions, one for the RTX 3080 Ti itself and another one for the Founders Edition variant.

RTX 3080 Ti Conclusion

At first, we were skeptical of the RTX 3080 Ti’s positioning in Nvidia’s RTX 30 lineup given the $400 premium over the RTX 3080 as well as being $300 cheaper than the RTX 3090. After seeing the results of our benchmarks, the RTX 3080 Ti at most, peaks at 30% more performance over the RTX 3080 and averages between 10-20% depending on the resolution. That said, 10-20% not as big if you’re already hitting over a hundred FPS but when at the two-digit mark can mean the difference of a smooth gaming experience. The RTX 3080 Ti is the next best GPU that can deliver the highest frame rate for this generation especially when you want to take advantage of the superb image quality produced by enabling Ray Tracing on some game titles. Overall, the RTX 3080 Ti can be thought of as a discounted RTX 3090 that manages to squeeze more performance if you find the RTX 3080 lacking in some game titles especially when Ray Tracing is taken into account

Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 Ti Founders Edition Conclusion

We retain to our stand on our take with the RTX 3080 Ti on our Inno3D iChill variant review – The RTX 3080 Ti is the best flagship gaming GPU you can get your hands on. Sure, there’s the RTX 3090 with 5% more cores, but that increase comes at the cost of an additional $300 and a thicker cooler that wouldn’t most cases as far as the Founders Edition variants are concerned. Having half of the 3090’s VRAM or basically an additional 2GB over the vanilla RTX 3080, enables the RTX 3080 Ti Founders Edition and AIB cards’ cooler to take in and dissipate more heat from the GA104 core resulting in a thinner shroud, lower temps, faster boost clocks and more stable frame rate as seen in our benchmarks. The RTX 3080 Ti Founders Edition with its updated shiny chaffed design and proven & tested flow-through cooler, is a must-have GPU for gamers for those who can afford it as it provides the best balance of frame rates, form factor, and price.

Grant Soriano

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Grant is a Financial Management graduate from UST. His passion for gadgets and tech crossed him over in the industry where he could apply his knowledge as an enthusiast and in-depth analytic skills as a Finance Major. His passion allows him to earn at the same time help Gadget Pilipinas' readers in making smart, value-based decisions and purchases with his reviews and guides.