NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 Ti Founders Edition Video Card Review

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NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 Ti Founders Edition Video Card Front View on Black Background

Conclusion

For the first time, we have been able to review the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 Ti, NVIDIA’s fastest Ampere GPU for gaming, RTX 3090 Ti graphics, it doesn’t get any better than this. On top of that, we looked specifically at the NVIDIA Founders Edition version of this video card today, so we could evaluate performance, power, temperature, and its behavior while gaming.

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 Ti is NVIDIA’s latest video card release, and now takes its seat firmly satisfying the full GA102 GPU Ampere gaming video card specification. This is Ampere with all its cards on the table, full spec with a high TDP to allow the best gameplay performance NVIDIA can provide on today’s latest GeForce RTX 30 Series family of GPUs.

This video card was announced in January 2022 and launched at the end of March 2022 with a hefty $1,999 MSRP price tag. With great pricing, comes great responsibility, and the GeForce RTX 3090 Ti certainly had a lot to prove to make it worthwhile at this price tag. Not only the price increases but also the TDP at 450W and therefore the level of computer build needed to run it. Don’t underestimate the power, space, and cooling needed to run this beast.

The very brief summary of specs, this is GA102-350 on Ampere architecture with 84 SMs, 10,752 CUDA Cores, 112 ROPs, 336 Texture Units, 84 RT Cores, and 336 Tensor Cores. It runs at a boost clock of 1860MHz and has 24GB of GDDR6X memory at 21GHz providing over 1TB/s of memory bandwidth at a TDP of 450W for $1,999. The Founders Edition uses NVIDIA’s custom PCB and heatsink design.

Performance

Starting off in Dying Light 2 at 4K with the highest in-game quality settings, minus Ray Tracing the GeForce RTX 3090 Ti Founders Edition provided a playable gameplay experience. It was the only video card to run at 60FPS average and did not require DLSS or FSR to be playable at 4K. But if you did want faster FPS, DLSS will bring that up to 90FPS on the GeForce RTX 3090 Ti FE. Compared to the GeForce RTX 3090 FE the RTX 3090 Ti FE was 11% faster.

In Rainbow Six Extraction the GeForce RTX 3090 Ti FE provided an incredibly high level of gameplay at 131FPS at 4K. But with FPS that jumps to 185FPS. This is with the highest in-game settings possible in the game. Compared to the GeForce RTX 3090 FE the RTX 3090 Ti FE is 12% faster. When we turned on TAA-2X, which is a very demanding setting the GeForce RTX 3090 Ti FE came out on top again above 70FPS at 4K. That is again 12% faster than the GeForce RTX 3090 Ti FE.

In Forza Horizon 5 the GeForce RTX 3090 Ti FE allowed a playable gameplay experience at 4K with the highest possible in-game settings. It allows 80FPS in the game at 4K, which matched the Radeon RX 6900 XT for gameplay. In Far Cry 6, we were able to play at 90FPS at 4K and the highest in-game settings, again setting a very high precedent for gameplay performance.

Cyberpunk 2077 was not playable at 4K and “Ultra” settings until we turned on DLSS. The GeForce RTX 3090 Ti FE was the only video card to be playable at 4K with “Ultra” settings utilizing DLSS. In MS Flight Sim we found the game to be rather CPU bound, and except for the Radeon RX 6900 XT, all the GeForce cards had a similar gameplay experience, which was very good at 50FPS at 4K. In Watch Dogs Legion the RTX 3090 Ti was very playable at 70FPS and with DLSS even better above 90FPS.

Ray Tracing was also the strongest on the GeForce RTX 3090 Ti Founders Edition. There are actually more RT Cores and Tensor Cores in the RTX 3090 Ti versus RTX 3090. This allowed a very playable experience in Dying Light 2 at 1440p with the highest level of Ray Tracing enabled. With DLSS this was even improved up to 93FPS. This was the only video card to really be playable with Full Ray Tracing in this game at 1440p. In Far Cry 6, all the video cards were playable with DXR ON at 1440p and 4K, these video cards are kind of bottlenecking the CPU in this game.

In Cyberpunk 2077 we found that the GeForce RTX 3090 Ti FE was the fastest video card at 1440p with Ray Tracing, but it still wasn’t exactly playable. We did have to utilize DLSS to make the game playable, and then the performance was very fast. However, all the other GeForce RTX video cards were also playable with DLSS at 1440p and Ray Tracing, so with DLSS, the RTX 3090 Ti doesn’t have as large of an advantage since all cards were also playable, except the Radeon RX 6900 XT.

Watch Dogs was also playable at 1440p and Ray Tracing on the GeForce RTX 3090 Ti FE without DLSS. Finally, metro Exodus Enhanced was also very playable on the GeForce RTX 3090 Ti FE at 1440p near 70FPS. here the RTX 3090 Ti FE was about 13% faster than the RTX 3090.

Power and Temperature

There is no doubt that the GeForce RTX 3090 Ti Founders Edition is a power-hungry video card. At 450W TDP we are literally talking over 100W higher than the GeForce RTX 3090 and GeForce RTX 3080 Ti, which used to be the fastest video cards available. That’s a very large step up in power draw, take for example the next lowest card down from the RTX 3090, the RTX 3080. Its TDP is 320W. There’s only a 30W difference between the RTX 3080 and RTX 3090. However, there’s a big 100W step between the RTX 3090 to RTX 3090 Ti.

That’s just a lot of power stepping up in video card versus the lower versions. Our results proved that result in board and chip power. That power increase has made it a necessity for NVIDIA to adopt the new PCIe Gen 5 16-pin connector now. You will need 3x 8-pin power connectors unless you have the new ATX 3.0 standard. Power utilization is on the rise, and unfortunately, this may be a sign of things to come.

At least NVIDIA did a good job managing all that power and thermal dissipation. It pulls a lot of Wattage, but that heat has to go somewhere. Thankfully NVIDIA actually managed a Voltage decrease on the GPU, which helps a lot, and they tweaked some cooling things. In the same video card size as the GeForce RTX 3090 Founders Edition they managed a cooler GPU package and Hot Spot temps on the GeForce RTX 3090 Ti Founders Edition, with lower fan speeds as well.

The NVIDIA engineers deserve a big kudos for the Founders Edition design and cooling build. It actually is very robust, very solid, feels professional, and does a great job cooling the GeForce RTX 3090 Ti GPU at default. It’s also very quiet while gaming. We can’t say enough about how well and how good the Founders Edition design looks.

Final Points

It’s expensive, but it is also a halo GPU. It can sit on a high throne of performance at a high price, and the people that want the ultimate performance, the best of the best, will buy it. There is no doubt from our testing that the GeForce RTX 3090 Ti is the fastest gaming graphics card in existence right now that you can buy. In all of our game testing, it provided the highest performance and truly allowed a phenomenal gameplay experience with all the features turned on. Whether it’s running “Ultra” settings at 4K, or “Ultra Ray Tracing” at 1440p, the GeForce RTX 3090 Ti provides the best experience. It may just be that edge you need to truly enjoy 4K gaming or Ray Tracing gaming.

In our evaluation we generally found the GeForce RTX 3090 Ti to offer an 11-12% performance advantage over the GeForce RTX 3090, so that is its expectation. That can lead to better performance in demanding games or allow you to flick on an extra quality setting that you could not before. In addition, in games that support DLSS, you truly get the best of it all. DLSS can drastically improve performance, and look good doing it. With the ability to have every graphics option on at high resolutions, or Ray Tracing, using DLSS is a welcomed gameplay experience advantage.

The NVIDIA Founders Edition design is well made and looks great. Just make sure you have the space in your case, a good quality power supply with enough juice, and plenty of case cooling if you chose to go with the GeForce RTX 3090 Ti Founders Edition. If all those things are properly in place, the GeForce RTX 3090 Ti Founders Edition can offer an incredible gameplay experience in today’s games.

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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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