GeForce RTX 3070 Ti FE in the test: The mini upgrade that will only work in 2021

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With the GeForce RTX 3070 Ti, Nvidia's GeForce RTX 3070 is getting a mini performance upgrade that goes hand in hand with a TDP that has been increased from 220 to 290 watts and the associated disadvantages. The test including a 220 watt comparison shows: If the warehouse were full, this configuration would have a very difficult time.

Table of contents

  1. 1 The mini upgrade that will only work in 2021
    1. The GeForce RTX 3080 Ti is followed by the GeForce RTX 3070 Ti
    2. The technology of the GeForce RTX 3070 Ti in detail
    3. The GeForce RTX 3070 Ti Founders Edition in detail
  2. 2 clock rates, benchmarks (FHD, WQHD & amp; Ultra HD) and ray tracing
    1. Test system and test methodology
    2. The actual average clock rates under load
    3. Benchmarks in 2,560 × 1,440
    4. Benchmarks in 1,920 × 1,080 and 3,840 × 2,160
    5. Benchmarks with ray tracing in Full HD, WQHD and Ultra HD
    6. Benchmarks with Nvidia DLSS including ray tracing
  3. 3 Volume, temperature, power consumption and OC
    1. Volume & amp; Cooling
    2. Power consumption: games, YouTube, desktop
    3. Energy efficiency in FPS per watt
    4. Overclocking: OC of GPU and memory
  4. 4 special test, price and conclusion
    1. RTX 3070 vs. RTX 3070 Ti at 220 watts
    2. RRP and market price
    3. Conclusion

GeForce RTX 3080 Ti is followed by GeForce RTX 3070 Ti

Nvidia is expanding the ampere portfolio that is barely available on the market or only available at exorbitant prices. It started a week ago with the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti (test) and thus a high-end product that features significantly more shader units, 2 GB more memory and the TGP of the GeForce RTX 3090 (test) from the GeForce RTX 3080 (test) was able to sell without disputing the flagship's exclusivity. But the Ti lacks its 24 GB memory.

Nvidia sees the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti as the new gaming flagship and, despite the name, is moving the GeForce RTX 3090 even more into the content creator corner. For gamers, grabbing the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti is still not easy, because the surcharge for the 3080 is very high at almost 500 euros in the price list and you will still not get a graphics memory that is definitely sufficient for the coming years. Nonetheless, the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti remains an – albeit very expensive – alternative to the price-performance champion RTX 3080 and it would also be if all graphics cards were available at the recommended retail price.

  1. Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070 Ti Founders Edition

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Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070 Ti Founders Edition
Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070 Ti Founders Edition

The GeForce RTX 3070 Ti, which will be available from tomorrow, June 10, looks different, as the test will show.

The technology of the GeForce RTX 3070 Ti in detail

The GeForce RTX 3070 Ti is the second and probably the last new amp model and, like the larger Ti variant, uses the new ETH mining brake and Resizable BAR ex works – the GeForce RTX 3070 still required a firmware update for rBAR. But what else is different?

With GDDR6X and GA104 on steroids

Nvidia left it with the GeForce RTX 3070 Ti with the GA104 GPU of the GeForce RTX 3070, but pushed the chip to the maximum in every respect. In this case, all 48 SMs are activated on the 393 mm² GPU, which results in 6,144 shader units, the basic variant had 2 SMs less. The theoretical computing power increases by 4 percent with the same clock rate – that is not much, but GA104 simply does not offer more execution units.

That's why there is also a bit more in terms of clock rates. Nvidia calls the GeForce RTX 3070 Ti a base clock of 1,575 MHz and an average turbo of 1,770 MHz, so that the official clock of the new graphics card is 45 MHz higher – that's another 3 percent more.

< p class = "p text-width"> In the TDP corset of the GeForce RTX 3070 this was no longer possible. Instead of 220 watts, the GeForce RTX 3070 Ti offers 70 watts more and thus 290 watts. That is only 30 watts below the TDP of the GeForce RTX 3080.

In addition to more execution units that clock higher, the immense surcharge also takes into account another innovation: Nvidia no longer installs classic GDDR6 on the GeForce RTX 3070, but GDDR6X memory, which according to all findings requires more energy, but also clocks significantly higher.

It works with 9,500 instead of 7,000 MHz on the new graphics card, with the same memory interface (256 bit, GA104 does not offer more), the memory bandwidth is 36 percent higher. There was a choice of 256-bit 8 GB and 16 GB storage volumes, Nvidia opted for 8 GB – so this Ti does not have more storage than the GeForce RTX 3070.

RTX 3090 RTX 3080 Ti RTX 3080 RTX 3070 Ti RTX 3070 Architecture Ampere GPU GA102 GA104 Process Samsung 8 nm Custom process Chip size 628 mm² 393 mm² Transistors 28 billion 17.4 billion GPC 7 6 6 SM 82 80 68 48 46 FP32- ALUs per SM 128 FP32-ALUs 10,496 10,240 8,704 6,144 5,888 RT cores 82 2nd Gen 80 2nd Gen 68 2nd Gen 48 2nd Gen 46 2nd Gen RT cores + ALUs synchronous Yes Tensor cores 328 3rd Gen 320 3rd Gen 272 3rd Gen 192 3rd Gen 184 3rd Gen base clock 1,400 MHz 1,365 MHz 1,440 MHz 1,575 MHz 1,500 MHz Boost clock 1,700 MHz 1,665 MHz 1,710 MHz 1,770 MHz 1,725 ​​MHz FP32 performance 35.7 TFLOPS 34.1 TFLOPS 29.8 TFLOPS 21.7 TFLOPS 20.4 TFLOPS FP16 performance 35.7 TFLOPS 34.1 TFLOPS 29.8 TFLOPS 21.7 TFLOPS 20.4 TFLOPS FP16 performance via Tensor 143 TFLOPS
285 TFLOPS (Sparsity) 136 TFLOPS
273 TFLOPS (Sparsity) 119 TFLOPS
238 TFLOPS (Sparsity) 87 TFLOPS
174 TFLOPS (Sparsity) 82 TFLOPS
163 TFLOPS (Sparsity) texture units 328 320 272 192 184 ROPs 112 96 96 Memory 24 GB GDDR6X 12 GB GDDR6X 10 GB GDDR6X 8 GB GDDR6X 8 GB GDDR6 Memory speed 19.5 Gbps 19.0 Gbps 14.0 Gbps Memory interface 384 bit 320 bit 256 Bit memory bandwidth 936 GB/s 912 GB/S 760 GB/s 608 GB/s 448 GB/s L2 cache 6 MB 5 MB 4 MB TDP 350 watts 320 watts 290 watts 220 watts slot connection PCIe 4.0 RRP 1,549 euros 1,199 euros 719 euros 619 euros 519 euros

In terms of GPU and storage volume, GeForce RTX 3070 Ti and GeForce RTX 3070 are much closer than GeForce RTX 3080 and GeForce RTX 3080 Ti, there is a bigger difference in memory bandwidth. The new Ti should only be able to set itself apart from the Non-Ti if it was previously a very limiting factor.

100 Euro surcharge for the GeForce RTX 3070

In terms of price, it does it: Nvidia sets the RRP at 619 euros, so the surcharge for the normal version is exactly 100 euros. The graphics card will be available from Nvidia and its German partner NBB from June 10th. Like the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti a week ago, it should be sold out before many interested parties have even been offered the option to buy – this certainly also applies to the presumably massively more expensive custom designs.

ComputerBase uses Nvidia's own Founders Edition to clarify whether the GeForce RTX 3070 Ti is worth the extra price in the price list and whether the product can compete with AMD's Radeon RX 6800.

The GeForce RTX 3070 Ti Founders Edition in detail

The FE is not only of interest in view of the graphics card hidden under the cooler, but also because of the cooling system. Because Nvidia has given the Ti a cooling system that has not yet been used.

To date, Nvidia had three different Founders Edition coolers in its portfolio for the Ampere generation. The smallest version for GeForce RTX 3060 Ti FE and GeForce RTX 3070 FE, a medium version for GeForce RTX 3080 FE and GeForce RTX 3080 Ti FE, as well as a large version that is currently used exclusively for the GeForce RTX 3090 FE – the GeForce RTX 3060 is not available as an FE.

  1. Power adapter of the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070 Ti Founders Edition

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Power adapter of the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070 Ti Founders Edition
Monitor connections of the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070 Ti Founders Edition
Power connection of the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070 Ti Founders Edition

A fourth FE cooler for the 3070 Ti

With the new graphics card, a fourth comes surprisingly Design. The fourth Founders Edition cooler of the Ampere generation is also part of the series, in terms of both visual and material quality, no Nvidia is currently ahead of anything. Even the most expensive custom models cannot keep up.

The cooling principle of the FE cooler of the GeForce RTX 3070 Ti FE, on the other hand, no longer corresponds to the traditional one as on the RTX 3070 FE, but is based on the unusual operation of the larger FE coolers for GeForce RTX 3080 (Ti) and GeForce RTX 3090 Fan positioned on two sides – just less material is used. The design is based on the cooler of the GeForce RTX 3070.

At 27 cm, the entire graphics card is one and a half centimeters shorter than the GeForce RTX 3080 (Ti) FE, with the dual-slot cooler ensuring the length. Because the PCB is significantly shorter, this is what makes the cooling concept possible.

Specification in grams Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 Ti Founders Edition 1.028 g Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070 Founders Edition 1.034 g Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070 Ti Founders Edition 1,185 g Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 Founders Edition 1,348 g Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 Ti Founders Edition 1,363 g

Its axial fan, with a diameter of 85 mm, sits on top of the graphics card when it is installed in order to suck in the cool air from below out of the housing through the fins, where the PCB has just come to an end. The second 85 mm fan, on the other hand, sits at the bottom and at the other end to blow the air onto the vapor chamber. The fans are as big as the old cooler or the cooler of the 3080 FE, with the shorter length and 1,185 g (200 g less than the 3080 FE) but less material is used under the hood. The fans remain on the Windows desktop for silent operation.

2 × 8-pin for a maximum of 320 watts

< p class = "p text-width">Of course, Nvidia sticks to its own specifications with the GeForce RTX 3070 Ti. Accordingly, the average boost is 1,770 MHz, while the 8 GB GDDR6 memory is controlled at 9,500 MHz. The TDP is 290 watts and can be manually increased to 320 watts. Accordingly, two eight-pin power connectors are required to operate the graphics card, which Nvidia implements on the graphics card with the specially developed 12-pin connector. This is also placed centrally on the side of the new cooling design, so that the power cable or the supplied adapter is always clearly visible when installed and also blocks the GeForce RTX lettering. That doesn't match the otherwise excellent look at all.

The GeForce RTX 3070 Ti Founders Edition offers three DisplayPort 1.4 connections with DSC compression and one HDMI 2.1.

Feature Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070 Ti
Founders Edition Card PCB design Nvidia length, width 27.0 cm, 11.0 cm Power supply 1 × 12-pin
adapter to 2 × 8-pin cooler Design Founders Edition, 2.0 slot heat sink vapor chamber
4 heat pipes
aluminum core/radiator fan 2 × 85 mm (axial) fan switched off (2D) yes start-up speed 500 revolutions cycle
(power saving mode ) GPU base 1,575 (210) MHz GPU average 1,770 MHz GPU maximum 1,950 MHz memory 9,504 (405) MHz memory size 8 GB GDDR6X, Micron power consumption Standard TDP 290 watts Maximum TDP 320 watts connections 3 x DisplayPort 1.4 DSC
1 x HDMI 2.1

On the next page: clock rates, benchmarks (FHD, WQHD & Ultra HD) and ray tracing