Conclusion
The MSI GeForce RTX 5070 Ti 16G VANGUARD SOC LAUNCH EDITION (G507T-16VGSL) is a brand new video card from MSI in their VANGUARD series of graphics cards, sporting SUPRIM-quality with a darker, sleek futuristic aesthetic and lots of RGB. The MSI GeForce RTX 5070 Ti VANGUARD SOC LAUNCH EDITION heralds the launch of factory overclocked or non-MSRP video cards for availability with the new NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Ti Blackwell GB203 GPU. This is our first look at a factory-overclocked GeForce RTX 5070 Ti, almost overbuilt to exceed in both raw performance and overclocking.
The MSI GeForce RTX 5070 Ti VANGUARD SOC LAUNCH EDITION is a factory overclocked card with an out-of-box GPU Boost of 2588MHz, compared to the reference spec 2452MHz, this being the “SOC” model. It comes with 16GB of GDDR7 on board at 28Gbps. With this being the LAUNCH EDITION, it is a special-edition version with a Lucky figurine inside the box, and the box has quite a hefty nature to itself. The MSI GeForce RTX 5070 Ti VANGUARD SOC video card uses MSI’s HYPER FROZR technology to deliver outstanding cooling performance and overclocking potential. It also supports MSI Center with a higher clocked mode available in software, as well as MSI Afterburner support with full manual overclocking.
Overclocking, Power, and Temp
Overclocking is definitely a strong point with the MSI GeForce RTX 5070 Ti VANGUARD SOC video card. One can really say this is overbuilt, but that strictly means there’s a ton of headroom on this video card for enthusiasts to play with. We used MSI Afterburner and found that we could increase the Power Limit up to 116%, a 16% increase in TDP from the default. That Power Limit increase alone gives it good headroom, but it gets even better with the MSI GeForce RTX 5070 Ti VANGUARD SOC. You see, we also found that it actually ends up running at a lower GPU Voltage than a previously reviewed GeForce RTX 5070 Ti video card.
We discovered that the MSI GeForce RTX 5070 Ti VANGUARD SOC runs, at default, up to 1.0200V while gaming. This is lower than a previously reviewed video card which runs at 1.0550V. Whether this is simply down to the design differences, or specific power tuning, or even the silicon lottery, the result is that the MSI GeForce RTX 5070 Ti VANGUARD SOC pulls less power while gaming and remains very efficient when overclocking.
It also means the MSI GeForce RTX 5070 Ti VANGUARD SOC doesn’t push past its TDP power limits at default or overclocked. It’s almost as if you don’t even need to increase the Power Limit because even overclocked it barely exceeds the default power limit! With the huge chasm of 16% Power Limit, this video card has tremendous room for overclocking on power, at least. The limiting factor is literally now the GPU, Voltage, and the silicon lottery. This is really nice to see.
In the end, we managed to push it past 3.2GHz, which is pretty amazing. We also pushed the memory up to 32Gbps, increasing memory bandwidth to 1TB/s. The result was gaming performance that increased in the range of 10% from overclocking in our tests, and this definitely improved the experience over the GeForce RTX 4070 Ti SUPER.
In terms of default board power, as we indicated the MSI GeForce RTX 5070 Ti VANGUARD SOC demanded power close to the GeForce RTX 4070 Ti, yet it is 20%+ faster. It also used less power than the GeForce RTX 4070 Ti SUPER and way less than a Radeon RX 7900 XT. When we overclocked it, the power increase followed the performance increase. The MSI GeForce RTX 5070 Ti VANGUARD SOC is just really that efficient, so if you are power-conscious but still want performance, the MSI GeForce RTX 5070 Ti VANGUARD SOC seems like a good call.
In terms of temperatures, what more is there to say, the MSI GeForce RTX 5070 Ti VANGUARD SOC ran the coolest we have seen and beat every other card in our comparison today. The MSI GeForce RTX 5070 Ti VANGUARD SOC had the lowest temperatures at default and even overclocked at auto fans. The takeaway from this is that overclocking to 3.2GHz was achieved with a low-speed auto fan of 45% while gaming, and therefore it was quiet. Quiet overclocking, that is what you can expect. The MSI GeForce RTX 5070 Ti VANGUARD SOC has great cooling, and you would think so anyway with the literally overkill cooling configuration it has.
Final Points
This has been our first look at the MSI GeForce RTX 5070 Ti 16G VANGUARD SOC LAUNCH EDITION, the first factory-overclocked GeForce RTX 5070 Ti we have reviewed. The MSI GeForce RTX 5070 Ti VANGUARD SOC impressed us in many ways that are enthusiast-tweaking ways. First, to the “SOC” nature of the video card, we did find that the factory overclock provided gaming performance that was a few percent higher than a stock reference clocked GeForce RTX 5070 Ti video card.
With the excellent cooling and power delivery the MSI GeForce RTX 5070 Ti VANGUARD SOC runs at a high default clock while gaming, around 2820MHz, which is quite a bit over the reference spec. This allows a good default experience out of the box. It does so with a very good GPU and memory temperature and is able to keep the fan speed low, thus making it very quiet while gaming. The gaming performance generally experienced is ~10% faster than the GeForce RTX 4070 Ti SUPER, and 20%+ faster than the GeForce RTX 4070 Ti. The MSI GeForce RTX 5070 Ti VANGUARD SOC would make an excellent upgrade from a previous generation such as GeForce RTX 30 Series, or lesser.
When it came to overclocking, the MSI GeForce RTX 5070 Ti VANGUARD SOC had incredible headroom that allowed a very high overclock to 3.2GHz and 32Gbps memory speed. Even better, it allowed us to do this overclock with auto fans, and they only ramped up to 45%. This again means silent gaming, even overclocked, and it kept the temperatures at 60c even in this scenario. We can’t understate how much headroom the MSI GeForce RTX 5070 Ti VANGUARD SOC has thermally, and how enthusiasts should have a lot of fun tweaking it to their heart’s content. We dare even say this card is ‘overbuilt.’
Availability and pricing will be the primary factor for the MSI GeForce RTX 5070 Ti 16G VANGUARD SOC LAUNCH EDITION. The MSI GeForce RTX 5070 Ti VANGUARD SOC can be an enticing video card, at the right price, if it is available. Keep an eye on availability and pricing, and if you are in the market for a GeForce RTX 5070 Ti and want to push one to its limits, the MSI GeForce RTX 5070 Ti VANGUARD SOC might be an interesting option.
Overall we like the design of the VANGUARD series, we think it is pretty striking in looks, and if you want to save a little money you could also look toward the VANGUARD OC model, but if you don’t want to fiddle with an overclock, the SOC model will offer the highest factory overclock in the VANGUARD lineup.