Question RTX3090 or RTX4080

Pigypop

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Jul 16, 2016
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Hello. I need some opinions here to help me decide. I was about to get an RTX 3090 but i waited to see the new cards. I think my budget can reach RTX 4080 12gb. They give an MSRP 899 but in my country it is always way higher than msrp. But 12gb seems a little disappointing. 192 bus and less than 10K Cuda Cores. I play games at 1440p and my eyes are pleased with good motion (fps). I dont count fps but when it falls under 60 i can notice that. I need a gpu that will hold 5 years like my 1080 did. Is 3090 an option here? Or maybe 3080 12gb? 3080ti is the same price as 3090 so no point mentioning it i can just get 3090
 
That less expensive RTX 4080 is exactly what you said, "disappointing." Nvidia decided to take their RTX 4070 chip and make it a less expensive 4080. I wouldn't give Nvidia that much money for a 70 series card masquerading as an 80 series card with only 12GB vram. They are forcing upgrades sooner by providing less vram. 24GB on their flagship GPUs is impressive and something to consider if long-term usage is a factor. On the other hand, I'm sure the 4080 12GB may be faster than the 3090 by a margin; however, I like the idea of standing on principle that holds more value in the long-term.

*Edit: From the looks and sounds of the RTX 4080 12GB around the web , speculation has its performance to be sitting somewhere around the RTX 3080 Ti in pure rasterization performance. This is excluding DLSS 3 comparisons, which is the proper way to compare two video cards considering that only a handful of games use DLSS anyway. Nvidia is pulling a veil over our minds to convince us to buy their products and play the games that cater to their products. I, personally, do not want to give them any money. I do not want to feed a monster that sees their product as a way to create new, more expensive needs instead of meeting the existing needs of their customers.
 
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It's tough to say. Since they haven't been reviewed yet. We don't know how much of the performance improvements are just corporate smoke blowing. Where the 4080 will shine in next gen games is DLSS3 and Ray Tracing 3.

The 3090 should still be usable in 5 years. Although it'll certainly be showing it's age. But if you want a card now. I expect it'll be tough to get your hands on a 4080 anytime soon. So, I'd just get the 3090. You could wait for AMD to release the 7000 series.
 

Pigypop

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Jul 16, 2016
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It's tough to say. Since they haven't been reviewed yet. We don't know how much of the performance improvements are just corporate smoke blowing. Where the 4080 will shine in next gen games is DLSS3 and Ray Tracing 3.

The 3090 should still be usable in 5 years. Although it'll certainly be showing it's age. But if you want a card now. I expect it'll be tough to get your hands on a 4080 anytime soon. So, I'd just get the 3090. You could wait for AMD to release the 7000 series.
Ι have a gsync monitor so i wont go for amd. DLSS3 could be switched off right?
 
The thing with the VRAM situation is NVIDIA's in a bind, and I wouldn't be surprised if AMD is going to be in a similar situation. As far as I know, neither Micron nor Samsung have a 32Gb (4GB) GDDR6 chip. And while I can find plenty of articles in 2018 saying that GDDR6 is capable of 32Gb and there were supposedly plans to make it, so far neither company has said anything about it (or my Google Fu isn't that strong at the time of this post)

Memory in video cards is also basically n-channel, which n being the number of VRAM chips on the card. And since each channel is 32-bit, a 192-bit memory channel means 6-channels. On top of that, for maximum performance, each memory channel should have its own memory controller. You could do something like segmented memory to add more VRAM, but nobody wants that anymore since the GTX 970.

This is also on top needing to route all those traces on the PCB, to make sure those traces can reliably carry the signal.

So these are your problems:
  • Maximum capacity per chip still appears to be 16Gb (2GB), which obviously means even more chips for more memory
  • To add more memory, you need to keep adding more memory controllers. This eats into die space, adds to power consumption, among other things
  • And to support more memory controllers/channels, you need a more complex PCB for routing and reliability.
While AMD probably can get away from the second problem with an off-die memory controller, it still doesn't resolve the first and third problems.
 
Its hard to decide. I can get a 3090 for 1100 or eait and maybe get a 3080 12gb for the same or even more?
Peoples expectations are different but I’m very satisfied with my 3080 10gb paired with a 1440p 240Hz monitor. I never bother with Ray Tracing, see little to no improvement in how games look unless I take screenshots and analyse them but not noticeable when actually playing, and the performance hit is significant. If RT is something that is important to you it looks like this is where 4000 will show very big gains if NVidia’s claims are vaguely true.
 

Pigypop

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Jul 16, 2016
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Peoples expectations are different but I’m very satisfied with my 3080 10gb paired with a 1440p 240Hz monitor. I never bother with Ray Tracing, see little to no improvement in how games look unless I take screenshots and analyse them but not noticeable when actually playing, and the performance hit is significant. If RT is something that is important to you it looks like this is where 4000 will show very big gains if NVidia’s claims are vaguely true.
No RT is not an issue for me. I just need a card that can produce 90+ frames on beautiful graphic settings on 1440p. My 1080 aged well but now can keep those frame rates i have to lower some stuff.
 

Pigypop

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Jul 16, 2016
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Personally, I'd pick 4080 12GB. Next gen is always better to have than older one for different reasons
Well i dont know if i will be able to get one of those 4080 12gb. And in my country it will cost much more than msrp. Way higher than a 3090. Plus the fact that i want to play decently for the next years to come but i dont know if i will have time to do that! So even if i can afford an expensive gpu im not really willing to spend that much. I regret getting asus pg279q. A 1080p monitor would be better option.
 
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4080 12gb oh you mean the card that should be a 4070:). In that video above he also says something to the effect there’s a possibility of fire if you disconnect the connector to much. Sound like a good reason to at least give the amd cards a look imo.

8gb should be enough for 1440 today but more is better. Kind of like 4gb was enough for 1080 not long ago. Now 4gb cards are mostly lower end.