Thanks for joining me today as we pit Nvidia‘s flagship GPUs head-to-head to see how the latest and greatest stacks up against a still-formidable last generation competitor.
Overview
At a high level, the RTX 4090 delivers transformational performance but demands an incredibly high asking price. The 3080 Ti enjoys wider availability and lower cost, but leaves some frames on the table. There‘s tradeoffs to consider around budget, 4K gaming ambitions, longevity needs and your appetite for cutting edge visuals powered by raytracing and AI.
By getting hands-on with both GPUs to benchmark real world game performance paired with a deep examination of architecture and technical specifications, we can better evaluate the decision around this $1,000+ investment in PC gaming glory.
Grab your preferred beverage, clear your calendar for the next 15 minutes and let‘s geek out together on the first battle between Ada Lovelace and Ampere…
Specification Showdown: David vs Goliath
On paper, Nvidia pulled out all the stops to truly dominate the last generation Kingpin 3080 Ti without mercy…
| Spec | RTX 4090 | RTX 3080 Ti | Advantage |
|---|---|---|---|
| GPU Codename | Ada Lovelace | Ampere | – |
| Launch Date | Oct 2022 | Jun 2021 | 4090 |
| Manufacturing Process | 4nm | 8nm | 4090 |
| CUDA Cores | 16384 | 10240 | 4090 +37% |
| Boost Clock Speed | 2520 MHz | 1665 MHz | 4090 +34% |
| Memory | 24 GB GDDR6X | 12 GB GDDR6X | 4090 +100% |
| Memory Bandwidth | 1008 GB/s | 912 GB/s | 4090 +10% |
| Length | 304 mm | 285 mm | 3080 Ti |
| Power Draw | 450w | 350w | 3080 Ti |
| Recommended PSU | 850w | 750w | 4090 |
| Release MSRP | $1599 | $1199 | 3080 Ti |
I don‘t need to tell you that the 4090 dominates nearly every category outside dimensions and power efficiency – where admittedly the 3080 Ti still holds ground. Note release MSRP figures quickly diverged from these suggested prices.
We could talk specs all day but what ultimately matters is frames per second pushing pixels to your high-end gaming monitor of choice. Let‘s examine benchmark results across top gaming titles at bleeding edge 4K resolution and max quality settings…
