NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Founders Edition Review

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Conclusion

Please check out the previous page: Performance Conclusion for a complete breakdown of the performance we experienced in this review.

The new GeForce RTX 30 Series lineup is starting to fill out.  It started with the launch of the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 on September 16th, where we reviewed the GeForce RTX 3080 Founders Edition video card with an MSRP of $699.  It continued with the launch of the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 on September 24th, which has an MSRP of $1,499.  Today, on October 27th NVIDIA continues with the launch of the GeForce RTX 3070 at $499, where we have reviewed the GeForce RTX 3070 Founders Edition.  Also, check out our GeForce RTX 3080 FE GPGPU Compute Workstation Performance review and our GeForce RTX 3080 FE Overclocking review.

NVIDIA is touting the GeForce RTX 3070 as the perfect all-around video card, capable of providing what you need in gaming-oriented workloads as it is the most advanced GPU ever in its class.  NVIDIA is marketing the RTX 3070 towards gamers, creators, and developers, but not just with performance, but also features.  Features to make games faster, but also provide broadcasters with more tools and to provide gamers, like e-sports gamers with better latency.  There are technologies like NVIDIA Reflex, RTX IO, and NVIDIA Broadcaster to help expand what you can do.

Comparisons

People will debate, and argue, on how to properly compare video cards.  There are several metrics by which one can put together and consider a “proper” comparison of video cards.  On one hand, there is the camp that says video cards should be compared by the same performance or performance-class they are trying to achieve.  On the other hand, some people think video cards should be compared by the labels manufacturers and marketing departments put on cards and classify them in terms of their place and position in the market. 

The method by which we (TheFPSReview) believe is the fairest, is to compare video cards by their pricing.  We believe that it is the price that should be the baseline by which video cards are compared.  The price we believe that should determine the comparison is the MSRP or Manufacturer Suggest Retail Pricing.  We could go by the current online pricing, but that pricing is dynamic.  What is currently available at a certain price point today, was not the same one year ago, and will not be the same one year from now, it changes.  Therefore, to represent the fairest comparison, we use the MSRP pricing.

By comparing video cards by price, we can therefore take two video cards and say for a certain dollar amount here is how they perform.  When can very objectively test and determine which one is faster and better for gaming given the same dollar amount.  We can say if you spend $499.99, Card A delivers this type of gameplay performance and features, and Card B delivers this, and compare.  We can then see the differences, and determine which one is the better value, for the money.  This is how we have always compared video cards, and this is how we will continue to compare video cards.

Flagship This Flagship That

The reason why we wanted to say all of this is because there is some current debate about the positioning of the GeForce RTX 3080 FE, GeForce RTX 3090 FE, and now GeForce RTX 3070 FE.  By positioning, we mean by which one is labeled as what by NVIDIA.  NVIDIA, you see, labels the GeForce RTX 3080 FE as the flagship video card for this generation.  While many say that it should actually be the GeForce RTX 3090 FE.  One thing the GeForce RTX 3090 is certainly not is a TITAN card or TITAN class card. It just isn’t. It is still a “GeForce” class card, right at the top of GeForce RTX performance. For comparison’s sake, the GeForce RTX 2080 Ti FE was the flagship video card of Turing. 

People like to think of video cards in terms of positioning and place them with a label such as “Flagship” or “Enthusiast” or “High-End” or “Midrange” or “Low-End”.  With no real clear definition of each, it is absolutely subjective what category you might want to say one GPU is in over another. 

Some might consider the GeForce RTX 3080 FE “High-End” while some might consider it “Midrange” given the fact that the GeForce RTX 3090 FE is the “High-End.”  In that definition, one might think of the new GeForce RTX 3070 FE as the “Midrange” video card of this generation.

Midrange?

What you are about to read is my opinion, and subjective. Well, I challenge that thinking.  Subjectively, I think of the Midrange as around the $299 level, or “xx60” series of GPUs. In that definition, I’d actually place, subjectively, the position of the GeForce RTX 3070 FE at $499 into the category of sitting between “Midrange” and “High-End”, something like a “High-End Midrange” kind of level, simply dictated by the pricing. 

This is not a “Midrange” card, I just don’t think it could be classified by that, simply due to the pricing.  The card to me is more High-End than it is Midrange.  It’s performance also reflects this, as it performs just shy of GeForce RTX 2080 Ti FE performance, which was the “Flagship” video card of NVIDIA’s RTX Turing architecture. However, there is also the argument that what is “Midrange” has been creeping up by price over time. We also do not yet know the full extent of the RTX lineup, so it’s hard at the moment to place it in a category until we see the full product stack. 

Power Efficiency

Let’s face it, the GeForce RTX 3080 Founders Edition is not a power-efficient video card.  We recommended, in that review, high-Wattage and quality power supplies, especially if you will be overclocking RTX 3080 based video cards.  However, that is not the case with the GeForce RTX 3070 Founders Edition.  We do not have to worry about the PSU issue with this new video card, it is actually power efficient compared to Turing last-generation NVIDIA GPUs.

In our testing the GeForce RTX 3070 Founders Edition used less power than a GeForce RTX 2080 SUPER FE, and GeForce RTX 2080 Ti FE.  This is important because the performance exceeded the GeForce RTX 2080 SUPER FE and matched the GeForce RTX 2080 Ti FE for the most part.  Yet, the RTX 2080 Ti FE operates at 100W more power demand from the wall.  That’s huge.  That means the GeForce RTX 3070 FE offers the same performance as the RTX 2080 Ti FE but at a 21% power savings.  That is indeed an efficiency improvement, what once took 100W more power to provide a certain performance level can now be done at 100W less power, for the same performance.  From Turing to Ampere, that’s an improvement. 

Now, the GeForce RTX 3070 FE does consume more power than the GeForce RTX 2070 FE it is replacing.  It’s about 12% more power.  However, considering we got a 50% performance boost, that also equates to a better efficiency out of the GeForce RTX 3070 FE.  For only a 12% power boost we got a very big performance boost at 50%.  That kind of small power increase is therefore understandable.  They are relatively close in power, unlike the comparison to the RTX 2080 Ti FE and RTX 3080 FE.  The RTX 3080 FE consumes 27% more power than the GeForce RTX 3070 FE.

Build Size

We wanted to briefly touch on the actual physical size of the GeForce RTX 3070 Founders Edition as well.  There were many complaints and worries over the size of the GeForce RTX 3080 FE, and especially the RTX 3090 FE.  Well, the GeForce RTX 3070 FE is in its own category, and quite compact for its performance level.  It is only 0.5” longer than a GeForce RTX 2070 FE, which was a small card as well for its time.  In fact, the GeForce RTX 3070 FE is actually narrower than the GeForce RTX 2070 FE. 

The GeForce RTX 3070 FE is a whole 1” shorter than the GeForce RTX 2080 Ti FE.  That means the same performance of GeForce RTX 2080 Ti FE but done so in a smaller package.  The GeForce RTX 3070 FE uses a lot less power than the GeForce RTX 2080 Ti FE, does so in a smaller physical size compared to the GeForce RTX 2080 Ti FE, runs cooler, and performs about the same.  That’s progress.

Final Points

At the end of the day, there are several things about the GeForce RTX 3070 Founders Edition that we like and see as positive for everyone.  At $499 it is priced the same as the GeForce RTX 2070 FE and RTX 2070 SUPER FE.  This means it is the direct upgrade path, from those last generation video cards. 

As an upgrade path, it has proven to provide 50% or more performance advantage from the last generation at the same price point.  It is so that it now compares on performance to the GeForce RTX 2080 Ti FE of the last generation.  That was a $1200 video card.  In the last generation, you had to pay $1200 for this kind of performance.  Now you can get what was $1200 performance, for $700 less at $499.  You now save, on generation-to-generation, $700 for the same performance.

It also provides this level of performance at much less power demand.  It also delivers this level of performance in a smaller package size and cooler GPU temperatures.  On generation-to-generation improvements, this is a positive evolution of graphics advancement. Technically, we would have liked to have seen more VRAM.  This seems like the right card to have been the one to carry 10GB of VRAM instead of 8GB in its default configuration.  Then the RTX 3080 could have had 12GB, that would have been a better lineup in our opinion.

At the more affordable $499 price point, you get an ideal playable gameplay experience at 1440p with everything turned on.  You can maximize graphics settings at 1440p and might even be able to turn on Ray Tracing depending on the game.  If Ray Tracing is ever too demanding, and the game supports DLSS, turning that on at 1440p will solve that easily.  This video card is not really suited for 4K, though it can muster decent performance, ultimately the limitation will be VRAM and performance in newer games.  Now that the RTX 3080 FE has been launched, that’s your 4K card with no compromises. 

The GeForce RTX 3070 Founders Edition earns its place as a proper replacement and upgrade path from the GeForce RTX 2070, and especially for anyone on GeForce GTX 1070 series. Add-in-board partner video cards will be available on October 29th. The GeForce RTX 3070 Founders Edition is the fastest $499 video card to date. It is well put together, and as a custom card from NVIDIA provides excellent thermals, package size, and remains quiet.

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Brent Justicehttps://www.thefpsreview.com
Former managing editor of GPUs at HardOCP for 18 years, Brent Justice has been reviewing computer components since the late 90s, educated in the art and method of the computer hardware review, he brings experience, knowledge, and hands-on testing with a gamer-oriented and hardware enthusiast perspective. You can follow him on Twitter - @Brent_Justice You can sub to his YouTube channel - Justice Gaming https://www.youtube.com/c/JusticeGamingChannel You can check out his computer builds on KIT - @BrentJustice https://kit.co/BrentJustice

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