Conclusion
In today’s review, we have evaluated the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 Founders Edition video card, ushering in the new GeForce RTX 40 Series GPUs from NVIDIA. The GeForce RTX 40 Series GPUs are based on NVIDIA’s new Ada Lovelace architecture, which you will also see called just the Ada architecture or Ada GPUs. The GeForce RTX 40 Series GPUs are manufactured on a new TSMC and NVIDIA-made custom 4N process. This allows 170% more transistors in a die size that is actually smaller than the previous generation, leading to improved performance and efficiency.
The GeForce RTX 40 Series improve in many ways, with a focus on adding many more CUDA Cores, more cache, and higher clock speeds. The GeForce RTX 4090 we reviewed today (AD102) has 16,384 CUDA Cores, 128 RT Cores (3rd Gen) and 512 Tensor Cores (4th Gen), and 176 ROPs. The L1 cache size has increased to 16,384KB, the L2 cache size has increased to 73,728KB. The GPU Boost frequency is at a record high 2520MHz on the Founders Edition. The video card is equipped with 24GB of GDDR6 at 21GHz offering 1008MB/s of memory bandwidth. All of this is in the same TDP as the GeForce RTX 3090 Ti at just 450W, for $1,599 MSRP.
Performance
| Overall Combined Game Average from Every Game in this Review of GeForce RTX 4090 FE Performance Uplift VS—> | GeForce RTX 3090 Ti | GeForce RTX 3090 | Radeon RX 6900 XT |
|---|---|---|---|
| Raster vs. Raster | 63% | 84% | 146% |
| Upscaling vs. Upscaling | 53% | 71% | 125% |
Raster
In our performance testing, we evaluated several games in rasterizing performance, Ray Trace performance, and DLSS upscaling performance. We also got an early look at DLSS 3 Frame Generation performance and latency. We have more planned for that later.
Starting off at 4K performance in F1 2022 the GeForce RTX 4090 FE allowed a playable gameplay experience at 4K and the highest in-game settings offering a whopping performance over 200FPS. Turning on DLSS improved that performance greatly up to 275FPS. It provided an advantage over the previous GeForce RTX 3090 by 96%. In Dying Light 2 we were able to play the game easily at 4K and the highest quality setting and enjoyed 100FPS on the GeForce RTX 4090 FE. Enabling DLSS improved this to over 150FPS. The GeForce RTX 4090 FE was 70% faster than the previous GeForce RTX 3090.
In Far Cry 6, we had an enjoyable gameplay experience at 4K and the highest settings with HD Textures at 130FPS. FSR improved performance up to close to 160FPS. The GeForce RTX 4090 FE was 55% faster than the previous GeForce RTX 3090. As demanding as Cyberpunk 2077 is, the GeForce RTX 4090 FE was the only video card to allow a playable gameplay experience at 4K and “Ultra” settings at 55FPS. Enabling DLSS greatly improved performance to near 80FPS. The GeForce RTX 4090 FE was 64% faster than the previous GeForce RTX 3090.
In Watch Dogs Legion the GeForce RTX 4090 FE was playable at 4K and “Ultra” settings at over 100FPS. Enabling DLSS improved performance up to near 140FPS. The GeForce RTX 4090 FE was 80% faster than the previous GeForce RTX 3090. In Shadow of the Tomb Raider, we could play the game at maximum settings at 4K and enjoy 178FPS. Enabling DLSS improved performance over 200FPS. The GeForce RTX 4090 FE was 91% faster than the previous GeForce RTX 3090.
Ray Tracing
In our gameplay experience, the GeForce RTX 4090 FE really excelled in Ray Tracing performance over the previous generation. It was the Ray Tracing performance differences that provided the highest gain in performance over the previous generation in our experience. In F1 2022 we could play this game at 4K, Ultra High Ray Tracing on the GeForce RTX 4090 FE at 84FPS. This was the only video card able to run this game at these settings smoothly enough. This provided a 105% (doubled) that of the GeForce RTX 3090. Further, enabling DLSS improved performance up to 138FPS at 4K.
Dying Light 2 was also able to run at the absolute highest High-Quality Ray Tracing at 4K smoothly on the GeForce RTX 4090 FE, and it was playable. The GeForce RTX 4090 FE was the only video card here to allow this level of gameplay. That put it 98% faster than the GeForce RTX 3090. Enabling DLSS further improved that to nearly 100FPS at 4K, with the maximum Ray Tracing. Alternatively, you could also play at 1440p with maximum Ray Tracing and get 100FPS without any upscaling at all.
In Far Cry 6, we could play at 4K with all the Ray Tracing turned on plus HD TExtures and still got over 100FPS on the GeForce RTX 4090 FE. Cyberpunk 2077 was demanding at 4K and “Ultra” Ray Tracing, but out of all the cards the GeForce RTX 4090 FE was the most playable, it really didn’t feel like it was in the ’40s, it felt smoother than that. Still, enabling DLSS really boosts performance up to 75FPS making it very enjoyable. It was 104% faster than the GeForce RTX 3090. Alternatively playing at 1440p with “Ultra” Ray Tracing was playable at 85FPS without any upscaling at all.
Watch Dogs Legion was playable at 4K and “Ultra” Ray Tracing on the GeForce RTX 4090 FE. In fact, this was the only video card able to provide a playable experience in these settings, and it was over 60FPS. Enabling DLSS takes it up to 97FPS. This was 83% faster than the GeForce RTX 3090. Shadow of the Tomb Raider was playable at 4K and the highest Ray Tracing at 120FPS, which was 97% faster than the GeForce RTX 3090. Finally, in Metro Exodus Enhanced we could play this game at 4K and maximum settings and Ray Tracing at 72FPS without upscaling. It was the only video card able to provide a playable experience in these settings. That’s 98% faster than the GeForce RTX 3090.
DLSS 3 Frame Generation
| Overall Combined DLSS Improvement versus No DLSS on GeForce RTX 4090 FE | All Games AVG |
|---|---|
| DLSS | 46% |
| DLSS3 w/Frame Generation | 134% |
We plan to do more testing with DLSS 3 in the future, once it is in games officially in non-Beta form, so stay tuned. In today’s launch review, we had limited time with DLSS 3. Our opinions today are based on our experiences in Cyberpunk 2077 and F1 2022 with DLSS 3 Frame Generation.
The way to summarize DLSS 3 is to say that it does improve the framerate. How much it improves the framerate varies by game, we saw bigger gains in Cyberpunk 2077, and lesser gains in F1 2022. This increase in framerate does improve the smoothness of motion. We didn’t experience any odd image quality glitches, like added motion blur. The games looked the same to us just playing them normally. Framerate isn’t the only factor in an enjoyable gameplay experience. Other factors like frametime and latency are big components.
Our testing has proven that DLSS 3 Frame Generation does add latency. NVIDIA is minimizing this latency addition by way of NVIDIA Reflex, which does succeed in this reduction. You get lower latency with regular DLSS upscaling, so when you add Frame Generation it increases that latency. If you did not use Frame Generation, you could benefit from better latency with regular DLSS upscaling, or, by utilizing NVIDIA Reflex without Frame Generation. The best latency in our testing was simply using the regular DLSS upscaling, without DLSS 3 Frame Generation.
You have to compartmentalize and separate Frame Generation from DLSS. The two technologies, DLSS upscaling, and DLSS Frame Generation are two very different things doing very different things. DLSS upscaling is rendering at a lower resolution and upscaling that image using clever AI to keep the image quality looking good. However, Frame Generation is not doing any upscaling, it is in fact creating synthesized or “fake frames.” These synthesized frames are inserted in-between frames and improve motion smoothness. It doesn’t do anything for image quality improvements, it’s all about smoothness of motion.
Think about it like this, you could potentially insert synthesized frames without having to upscale the resolution. If NVIDIA wanted to, it could completely remove Frame Generation on its own from the DLSS upscaling part, and just make it insert synthesized frames without having to upscale, decoupling them completely. We think this might actually be a good move if they did this.
Thankfully, as it is now, Frame Generation is a toggle, it’s either on or off. If it is on then it is DLSS 3, but if it is off then it’s just regular DLSS 1 or 2 upscaling. It might have been less confusing though, to not call it DLSS 3 and just call it Frame Generation or some other clever acronym. We kind of wish DLSS 3 had been all about improving DLSS image quality instead, leaving DLSS to just represent upscaling, and letting Frame Generation be its own thing in our opinion.
Because DLSS 3 Frame Generation is inserting synthesized frames the average FPS number in benchmarks will be inflated. Keep in mind that the synthesized frames are not being rendered by the game engine or the regular rendering pipeline, but instead created by the GPU. In the past, GPUs just interpreted the game engine’s demands and rendered what it was told, but now the GPU is taking charge, and rendering what it wants to. An interesting question to ask is how do the game developers feel about the GPU taking over this task, and rendering something they didn’t intend from their game?
Power and Temp
One of the big concerns people had in regard to the GeForce RTX 4090 was power demands. The Founders Edition has an option, 3x PCIe 8-pin power is only required for default operation (450W). A 4th optional PCIe 8-pin power connector can be used for overclocking, to provide up to 600W of power. Or, you can use one of the new PCIe 5 450W or 600W 16-pin connectors, so you have options. There is no difference in power and performance at default between them as we found out.
It seems NVIDIA does have a lot of options in terms of power scaling with the GeForce RTX 40 series and various performing parts at different power levels. This generation affords them a lot of flexibility in what they could do. Thankfully NVIDIA went with just a maximum of 450W TDP on the GeForce RTX 4090. This level of power is still enough to double the performance over the GeForce RTX 3090, more than double it with Ray Tracing, and even more when you throw in DLSS/DLSS 3.
In our power tests, we found that you just simply do not need to worry about power as much as you might have thought. NVIDIA has addressed the transient power spike issue and worked to ensure a smooth, consistent power delivery. The Founders Edition is amped up with PCB layers, and power phases. In addition, you will not always be at the maximum TDP of the video card if you are running at lower resolutions or lower game settings, or running DLSS or DLSS 3. But even if you do work the video card hard by playing something like Cyberpunk 2077 at 4K with Psycho Ray Tracing, you still won’t maximize the TDP according to our training. This proves that the Ada Lovelace GPUs are power efficient for what they are.
The Founders Edition is so overbuilt that it keeps the GPU cool under 70c in normal operation. The fans hardly spin up fast, and the video card is very quiet because of this. It’s a thick card, but that allows a cool and quiet operation.
Final Points
The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 Founders Edition is the fastest video card for gaming, in every way possible. We found that it can offer up to 2x the performance of the previous generation GeForce RTX 3090 FE video card. This depends on the game, and game settings, so in the best scenarios you can see in the ’90s to 100% performance benefit over the RTX 3090. Compared to the GeForce RTX 3090 Ti this can be up to 75% faster, generally between 60-70%. We also found that the GeForce RTX 4090 FE benefits the most from the previous generation in Ray Tracing performance. We can say that its Ray Tracing performance advantage exceeds that of its regular rasterization performance, and in those gaming scenarios you will see a bigger benefit.
The GeForce RTX 4090 FE also benefits from DLSS upscaling, and when you combine DLSS upscaling to improve performance there should be no scenario that isn’t playable. We found that 4K and “Ultra” settings in games are very playable, even on the most demanding games. In addition, games are now playable with high levels of Ray Tracing at 4K as well. This is the first time in a generation of video cards where we really feel the era of 4K gaming, and Ray Tracing gaming is an actual reality. Performance is so good that you can actually play at 4K and the highest game settings with smooth performance and also utilize Ray Tracing in games.
DLSS 3 Frame Generation is cool and interesting, but the question is, did we really need it? DLSS upscaling already improved performance in games, and does a great job, with high image quality and performance that rivals FSR. Did we really need a boost of even more FPS on top of it, to the detriment of latency? Maybe in CPU-limited games. Maybe the focus should have been on image quality. We will have to test more games of course, but this is a good question to ask. So far, in all of our testing, DLSS upscaling alone has been enough to make games playable when they weren’t, and you can always increase the performance mode of DLSS to gain even more FPS. In the end, DLSS upscaling by itself will always have the best latency versus Frame Generation.
Overall, NVIDIA claimed 2x-4x performance improvement with the GeForce RTX 40 Series. It is obvious that the 4x number was with DLSS 3 Frame Generation. We feel NVIDIA did not need to exaggerate the performance gain because in our testing the performance gain with the GeForce RTX 40 Series is actually exceptional on its own merit. We are getting a 2x increase from the previous generation. That’s a 100% improvement in framerates. This is a big leap over the previous generation. In the recent past, we are used to seeing only 30-40% gains, so this bucks the trend of performance upgrades per generation we’ve been getting and gives us a tremendous jump in performance. It reminds us of the good ole days when each generation use to provide double the performance. This is good news, and we think the GeForce RTX 4090 Founders Edition is a very worthy upgrade and provides the best gameplay experience with a full feature suite for gamers and creators.