NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Ti Founders Edition, 8GB GDDR6X, HDMI, 3x DP

Die RTX 3080 Ti war der erste Streich, der zweite folgt sogleich: Die Geforce RTX 3070 Ti geht am 10. Juni um 15 Uhr für offiziell 619 Euro UVP in den Verkauf und wirkt somit auf den ersten Blick verführerisch günstig. PCGH prüft im ausführlichen Test, ob die RTX 3070 Ti der Radeon RX 6800 den Rang als Oberklasse-Champion ablaufen kann.

Der Ti-Refresh geht weiter. Nachdem NVIDIA in der vergangenen Woche die GeForce RTX 3080 Ti auf den Markt brachte, folgt heute schon das nächste Modell: die GeForce RTX 3070 Ti. Auch hier schraubt NVIDIA den Ausbau der Ampere-GPU nach oben, vermutlich um die Radeon RX 6800 deutlicher in die Schranken zu verweisen bzw. der Radeon RX 6800 XT etwas näher zu kommen. Ob dies gelingt, wo NVIDIA die Stellschrauben angelegt hat und was Gigabyte und Inno3D daraus gemacht haben, schauen wir uns auf den kommenden Seiten an.

Mit der GeForce RTX 3070 Ti erhält Nvidias GeForce RTX 3070 einen Mini-Performance-Upgrade, das mit einer von 220 auf 290 Watt angehobenen TDP und den damit korrespondierenden Nachteilen einhergeht. Der Test inklusive 220-Watt-Vergleich zeigt: Wären die Lager voll, hätte diese Konfiguration einen sehr schweren Stand.

Okay, we are reaching the end of this review. After a ton of benchmarks, we can get a much clearer picture of what the RTX 3070 Ti represents in terms of value. This term of value becomes extremely difficult to define when nothing is being purchased at MSRP. I understand the frustration many face and it seems a bit silly to tell people my opinion on a product you essentially will not be able to buy for another six months. However like a bottle of wine, as this review ages, the content and benchmarks are still relevant when comparing hardware across multiple GPU generations.

While the RTX 3080 Ti Founders Edition just used the same cooler as the RTX 3080 Founders Edition, the RTX 3070 Ti Founders Edition is a unique design. The card comes in between the 3080 and 3070 in length and mixes features we saw in the 3080 like having the fans on both sides and the backplate design with the S-shaped shroud design of the original RTX 3070 Founders Edition. The end result is a really good looking card, I might even like it more than the X-shaped design that the 3080 uses and I like that a lot. Being a Founders Edition, it is of course an all-metal design which means solid construction, no worries of the card bowing or flexing in the future, and it feels like you have something valuable when you hold it. I hate that I even have to say it, but Nvidia also keeps the size of the cards down to reality, sticking with the standard 2 slot design and with the height being that of a standard PCIe card not just going crazy with things. So you only have to worry about length when figuring out if it will fit.

While the GeForce RTX 3070 Ti has a clear advantage over the Radeon RX 6800 with Ray Tracing in the mix, the slightly lower-priced Radeon trades blows with the 3070 Ti everywhere else. AMD's Radeon RX 6800 also has double the memory, which could pay dividends down the line as game assets get larger and more complex. With all of that in mind, the GeForce RTX 3070 Ti's $599 MSRP is justifiable, if not terribly exciting. Then again, NVIDIA's new GeForce RTX 3070 Ti effectively offers better-than-RTX 2080 Ti performance, at lower power, and at a roughly 50% lower introductory price. If you sat out the previous generation and are rocking a GTX 10-series card or older Radeon, the GeForce RTX 3070 Ti represents a major upgrade in terms of performance and features. It's also easily overclockable, runs cool and quiet, and will give you access to all of NVIDIA's latest software features and technologies. Once we're not contending with supply chain shortages and street prices return to normal levels (hopefully soon), the GeForce RTX 3070 Ti should be on your short list of considerations if you're a 1440P (or lower res) gamer and it falls within your budget.

As an RTX 3070 replacement that slots in at the same price point, perhaps in a year's time, the 3070 Ti would have been great - a nice performance bump without any downsides apart from increased power draw. As it stands though, we can't recommend the 3070 Ti while the 3060 Ti, 3070 and 3080 all offer considerably better value.

What's the point of this card? The RTX 3070 Ti only microscopically more capable than the RTX 3070 on paper, and okay, we've no idea of the price, but we bet it isn't the same MSRP. It needs to be given that it's barely faster than the GPU it replaces; otherwise, why release the Ti. Heck, we've had a couple of games where it isn't faster. That's the downside of Nvidia of giving only a little more hardware. It's enough to reduce the peak and average clock speeds but not enough to overcome that raw speed deficit.

Hot on the heels of our RTX 3080 Ti review, today we are back with a look at Nvidia’s RTX 3070 Ti. While the core-count has only slightly increased from the RTX 3070, the RTX 3070 Ti is able to deliver a 36% increase to memory bandwidth thanks to its use of GDDR6X memory, instead of the slower GDDR6 modules found on the original model, we put this new GPU through its paces to see what sort of performance it can offer.

The Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070 Ti comes armed to the premium graphics card party with a full implementation of the mainstream GA104 Ampere die. Further boosting performance compared to the non-Ti variant by using 19Gbps GDDR6X memory, the on-paper specifications paint it in a positive light at the supposed $599/£529 price point. Truth is not so kind. Nvidia's decisions increase the power budget by a considerable 70W over the non-Ti model but performance only scales seven per cent higher, due to a lower real-world boost speed and a lack of benefit from faster, power-hungry GDDR6X memory. In that respect, the Ti is not a good a deal as last year's standard RTX 3070: the modest speed increase arrives with one-too-many compromises caused by Nvidia driving this GPU hard.

If power/heat/noise is only secondary to you, and you can find the RTX 3070 Ti at a reasonable price (whatever you choose that to be), then I can recommend the card, only barely. Strong alternatives are RTX 3070 non-Ti, Radeon RX 6800 and RX 6700 XT.