NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Review – Farewell 1080p and welcome sweet 4K gaming!

So significant has been and still is the hype related to this series of new Nvidia video card that even the rumor mill has been more bubbling than ever in the recent history. The Internet burst out of leaks, rumors, more or less accurate data, at least until the moment when Jensen, the head of Nvidia, raised the Champions League trophy above his head: an RTX 3090 in all its splendor. At the moment we are not focusing on RTX 3090, its time will come for sure, as will also come for RTX 3070, but on the sweet spot of the RTX 3000 Series, particularly the actual RTX 3080.
Indeed, it’s been two weeks since we started playing literally and figuratively, but especially literally, with the RTX 3080, about which Jensen said that it will exceed all the conceivable expectations and that will provide double performance compared to the 2080! We repeatedly wondered: is it possible that this card survives its own hype, the level of expectation it itself has created? The GTX 1000 series was exceptional following the dull GTX 900 series, the latter probably the last poor quality one produced by them. The RTX 2000 series was a good one, but the RTX 3000 looks to be an historic first. It is for the first time when a hardware manufacturer at such level does not rest on the laurels of the previous two good series and comes up with a new one that provides no more nor less than double efficiency!
The expectations have been somehow confirmed by the fact that RTX 3080 is completely different that all the previous series: the card is beautiful integrating a matte, fine and imposing black radiator and two fans disposed on opposite sides. We didn’t know much about this card when it came out, except the double efficiency promising and a capacity of 10GB of RAM, which is more than usual for a card.
Specifications and other monsters
Before we reveal what can happen in real life, let’s take a closer look to the technical specifications, as there are some interesting aspects on paper that point to what we should expect.
GPU | RTX 2080 | RTX 3080 |
SMs | 48 | 68 |
CUDA Cores | 3072 | 8704 |
Tensor Cores | 384 (2nd Gen) | 272 (3rd Gen) |
RT Cores | 48 (1st Gen) | 68 (2nd Gen) |
Texture Units | 192 | 272 |
ROPs | 64 | 96 |
Boost Frequency | 1815 MHz | 1710 MHz |
Memory Frequency | 7751 MHz | 9500 MHz |
Video Memory | 8192 MB GDDR6 | 10240 MB GDDR6X |
Memory Interface | 256-bit | 320-bit |
Memory Bandwindth | 496.1 GB/s | 760 GB/s |
Power Draw | 250W | 320W |
Out of this apparently monotonous data, we realize that Nvidia’s claims about double efficiency, unprecedented feature from a generation to the next, seem to be realistic. And the list of improvements does not stop here. I would start by mentioning the most important one:
- HDMI 2.1 – I have been waiting for this feature for years and now I have the possibility to test even 4K 120Hz or 8K 60Hz TVs. But Nvidia does not stop here: together with the support for 8K resolution through a single cable, GeForce RTX 3000 also offers the possibility to capture 8K HDR images via GeForce Experience. This way there will be no need to use a special card for capturing 8K materials. The only limitation is on the frame rate, the capture being limited to 30FPS at the moment. We should linger on the 8K area as there is a new video codec.
- Normally the H.264 codec requires up to 140Mbps for a free-flowing transmission at this resolution. With the new AV1 the required bandwidth is reduced by more than 50%. Nevertheless, this had not become a standard due to the enormous load it puts on the system processor, but the point is that the new NVIDIA cards provide hardware graphics acceleration for it, so you can now watch 8K60 HDR content directly from YouTube without any of problem. So 8K is here.
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 – Deep Dive
And after all this enthusiasm burst, let’s get back to 3080 and start to analyze it closely. The very first question a passionate user will ask would be: does it cool down? I must admit that previous to this card, I was used to the standard format of video cards, that is either with a turbine cooling, a system that for better or for worse has almost disappeared since the 2000 series, or a configuration with two or three fans, or in extreme cases even four. But it has never happened before to see a video card with a fan on one side and one on the opposite side.
The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Founders Edition tries to get us a little bit out of our comfort zone, to make us perceive things from a different perspective, non-conformist and more rebellious, at least at a first glance. The cooling system on this card works like this: the fan “on the front” of the card has the role of ensuring a constant flow of cold air over the graphics core and the components around it. We have seen it before, we know how it works. But what about the other fan? This fan does not actually blow air downwards, but draws it from there, because contrary to logic and expectations, it does not rotate clockwise, but vice versa.
This means that you have to build your PC around the video card. First of all, I strongly believe that the most suitable air route in the casing that will host this video card must be on the vertical axis. This means that the base of the casing should be the intake area, while the evacuation will be through the upper part, so the ideal scenario would be for the airflow to circulate vertically to cool the video card. And in any case, cooling should be done in such a way as to provide separate cooling flows for the CPU and GPU. But, you may be wondering, how effective is this cooling? Well, the card did not overpassed 80 degrees Celsius during the tests we performed. If this seems disconcerting, I must say clearly that the RTX 3080 was quieter than the ROG Strix RTX 2080 I usually use; and the latter is a very silent card itself.
The sound became noticeable, but not annoying, in the scenario where we set ourselves the fans’ speed and created a more aggressive curve, while the temperatures were around 65-70 degrees, depending on the degree of use.
Does its performance live up to the hype?
The cooling issue being fairly clarified, let’s not waste time and talk about the essence: how is the performance? The moment when Jensen said that the RTX 3080 will provide twice the efficiency of the RTX 2080 was monumental. Only after two years since the previous generation has been launched, another one comes out and it is supposed to be twice as efficient?! We decided to test it on a somewhat more unusual test bench; just like the card itself.
The set up includes an AMD Ryzen 5 3600X processor with all cores clocked at 4.2GHz on an ASRock B550 Extreme 4 motherboard. The memory used is a 16GB HyperX Fury Black kit at 3200MHz and a be quiet 1000W Power Zone PSU used for power! And before you might complain saying that the processor is weak, we tested the card on a Ryzen 7 3800XT, and the differences were insignificant, if not completely absent. Why? Because we made a decision that will certainly stir up the anger of the majority: we eliminated from the test a certain scenario, namely the FullHD resolution. This card is no longer designed for that.
That is right, the 1920 × 1080 resolution is still the most popular, but the world moves forward, not backward, and having the new next-gen consoles that promise gaming at a minimum of 1440p with 60FPS, we considered it is fair enough to adapt the set ups to their use. Therefore, all the tests were performed at 1440p resolutions, i.e. 2K and 2160p, i.e. 4K, with all the details at the highest graphic preset and where appropriate we also had Ray-Tracing and DLSS enabled. In addition, the tests session also includes the results obtained from RTX 2080 on the same test platform.
We didn’t even realized it was 6 a.m., because every new result was fascinating. We start with the appetizer, namely the synthetic tests. We used SuperPosition on the 4K Optimized settings, TimeSpy and last but not least, FireStrike Ultra 4K. Where RTX 2080 got very good results, which will embarrass even unreleased consoles, RTX 3080 started quite shy. It wasn’t even close to the performance of the second RTX 2080, but it put the RTX 2080 Ti in its place without too much stress.
After these results, rather encouraging than enlightening, we moved on to the real world, that is, to what we are really interested in: the game tests. And obviously, we tested the RTX 2080 for the first time in order to have a comparison term, and the results look something like this.
What do you think it comes out of this? Have you realized? You could see that as we used newer titles, the balance tilted even more towards the new video card. Clearly, in older games there are differences, but the performance is not double. But in the new, recently released titles, such as Horizon Zero Dawn, we can see how the PCI-Express 4.0 and its bandwidth enhances the memory and provides a substantial performance boost. As far as Wolfenstein’s case concerns, to be honest, before the test session we received an email from NVIDIA mentioning that the game was specially optimized for RTX 3000. As a digression, we would like to emphasize something very important. It is NOT bad that we got such results and that the difference was so significant. This means that the new generation has not only brought a gross performance boost, but also implements better technologies such as Ray-Tracing and DLSS 2.0, which has been definitely noticed in this game. And this should be a very good indicator for what’s to come; for the future of PC gaming.
Is the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 worth it?
It is worth highlighting that the RTX 3080 and its generation were not released to fix current problems or to prove that there is still undiscovered processing power. NVIDIA’s RTX 3000 series is now a benchmark, an example to follow and a proof in metal and plastic that gaming at 4K 60FPS resolution with technologies such as Ray-Tracing is perfectly achievable, and the costs are not so big. This new technology needed only to grow, and certain standards had to be overpassed. These new cards know what they want from buyers, as well as buyers should know what they want from them. This video card manufacturer has proved that PC gaming is here to stay as an alpha male and no matter if AMD gains financially with the implementation of hardware in the new consoles, the best solution for PC gamers still remains NVIDIA. For now, at least. And it is almost impossible that the new consoles will change this hierarchy. We are convinced that the RTX 3090 will devour it completely in direct comparisons, but we also consider that the price difference is appropriate to separate the public, the consumers of these products.
In the end I will try to answer a question that is consuming: what will happen to the 2000 series, and more specifically, what happens if you own such a card or worse, have you recently purchased such a card? The 2000 series is not outdated, you don’t have to rush to sell your card. For a long time to come, the 2000 series will be viable, to play absolutely anything that exists on the market now. It will slip into irrelevance once the released games, in the medium to long-term future, will be better adapted and optimized for the new series. Until then, nobody has to worry but enjoy peacefully and without frustration anything you have. On the other hand, if you don’t have such a card, you are still at the 1000 series or even older, do not rush to buy a 2000 because it will be cheaper. It’s a wrong thought and you shouldn’t fall into this trap. Get 3000, and you won’t regret it. And it is no coincidence that we kept the discussion about the price at the end. The 3000 series is not only better and more powerful than the 2000 series, but also has a price about the same as the 2000 series at its launch. The recommended price announced at its disclosure would be $700. Sure, it’s not small, but it’s one of the few times when we would say that the asking price is not only fair and fully justified, but also lower than we would have expected given that this card confirms everything that has been said about it.