NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 Ti SUPER Review – Featuring ASUS
Impressive performance gains, same price tag
The second of NVIDIA’s new GeForce RTX SUPER cards is launching, and this one might be more interesting than the GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER. In a nutshell, the GeForce RTX 4070 Ti SUPER replaces the original GeForce RTX 4070 Ti, remains at a list price of $799, and bridges the gap between that original GeForce RTX 4070 Ti and the GeForce RTX 4080.
Is this the new go-to NVIDIA GPU for an enthusiast rig? What about those rare brand-agnostic people who just want to know how this card fares against the Radeon 7000 Series cards at this price level? We will attempt to answer these imaginary questions with real benchmark results, and also some synthetic ones.
Here’s a look at how the top of the RTX 40 Series lineup will look going forward:
RTX 4070 | RTX 4070 SUPER | RTX 4070 Ti SUPER | RTX 4080 SUPER | RTX 4090 | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
GPU | AD104 | AD104 | AD103 | AD103 | AD102 |
SMs | 46 | 56 | 66 | 80 | 128 |
CUDA Cores | 5888 | 7168 | 8448 | 10240 | 16384 |
Tensor Cores | 184 | 224 | 264 | 320 | 512 |
RT Cores | 46 | 56 | 66 | 80 | 128 |
Base Clock | 1920 MHz | 1980 MHz | 2340 MHz | 2295 MHz | 2235 MHz |
Boost Clock | 2475 MHz | 2475 MHz | 2610 MHz | 2550 MHz | 2520 MHz |
Texture Units | 184 | 224 | 264 | 320 | 512 |
ROPs | 64 | 80 | 112 | 112 | 176 |
L2 Cache | 36MB | 48MB | 64MB | 64MB | 72MB |
Memory | 12GB GDDR6X | 12GB GDDR6X | 16GB GDDR6X | 16GB GDDR6X | 24GB GDDR6X |
Memory Data Rate | 21 Gbps | 21 Gbps | 22.4 Gbps | 22.4 Gbps | 21 Gbps |
Memory Interface | 192-bit | 192-bit | 256-bit | 256-bit | 384-bit |
Memory Bandwidth | 504 GB/s | 504 GB/s | 716 GB/s | 716 GB/s | 1 TB/s |
Transistor Count | 35.8B | 35.8B | 45.9B | 45.9B | 76.3B |
Die Size | 294 mm^2 | 294 mm^2 | 379 mm^2 | 379 mm^2 | 609 mm^2 |
Process Tech | TSMC 4N NV Custom | TSMC 4N NV Custom | TSMC 4N NV Custom | TSMC 4N NV Custom | TSMC 4N NV Custom |
TGP | 200W | 220W | 285W | 320W | 450W |
List Price | $549 | $599 | $799 | $999 | $1599 |
The GeForce RTX 4070 Ti was based on the same AD104 GPU as the RTX 4070 (and new RTX 4070 SUPER), while this new RTX 4070 Ti SUPER is based on AD103. This move gives the RTX 4070 Ti SUPER a lot more in common with an RTX 4080 than an RTX 4070.
And, while nowhere near the RTX 4080 in SM count, this 4070 Ti SUPER has the same 256-bit memory interface and GDDR6X data rate as the RTX 4080, with both providing 716 GB/s of memory bandwidth (up from 504 GB/s with the RTX 4070 Ti).
The ASUS TUF Gaming Card
NVIDIA provided us with a sample from ASUS, with this card a member of the TUF Gaming family. In design it is virtually identical to the ASUS GeForce RTX 4070 Ti we reviewed one year ago, combining a large heatsink and triple fans to keep this card very cool and quiet during operation.
Features of the ASUS TUF Gaming GeForce RTX 4070 Ti SUPER include dual ball bearing axial-tech fans “scaled up for 21% more airflow”, military-grade caps “rated for 20K hours at 105C”, and a strong metal exoskeleton design. It’s a pretty large card, measuring some 305 x 138 x 65 mm / 12 x 5.43 x 2.55 inches.
Performance Testing
PC Perspective GPU Test Platform | ||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Processor | AMD Ryzen 9 7950X (Stock) | |||||||
Motherboard | MSI MEG X670E ACE Resizable BAR Enabled | |||||||
Memory | 32GB (16GBx2) v-Color Manta XPrism @ DDR5-6000 CL30 | |||||||
Storage | SK Hynix Platinum P41 2TB NVMe SSD | |||||||
Power Supply | be quiet! Dark Power Pro 12 1500W | |||||||
Operating System | Windows 11 Pro, 21H2 | |||||||
Drivers | Adrenalin 22.40.00.57 – 23.12.1 GeForce Game Ready Driver 526.72 – 546.52 GRD 551.15 (RTX 4070 Ti SUPER press driver) |
3DMark
Let’s look at some performance numbers, beginning with Speed Way, the DX12 Ultimate benchmark from 3DMark rendered at 2560×1440:
In Speed Way the GeForce RTX 4070 Ti SUPER is around 11% slower than an RTX 4080, and around 16% ahead of the original RTX 4070 Ti. This increase in performance is well worth the additional cost of the RTX 4070 Ti SUPER, which is $0.00 more than the original non-SUPER version.
Moving away from lame jokes and onto a raster test, here’s Time Spy Extreme, a standard DX12 benchmark rendered at 3840×2160:
Similar placement for the RTX 40 Series cards again near the top of the chart, with the difference between the original RTX 4070 Ti and this new RTX 4070 Ti SUPER in Time Spy Extreme at just over 10%, and a ~15% gap between the 4070 Ti SUPER and the RTX 4080 in this test.
3440×1440 Ultrawide Testing
Moving on to the game benchmarks, we will again (as with the RTX 4070 SUPER review) explore performance with very high detail settings (the highest each title supports) using this editor’s preferred 3440×1440 ultrawide resolution.
In no particular order, here are a few benchmark results:
The GeForce RTX 4070 Ti SUPER is within about 13% of the performance of the RTX 4080 overall in these tests, while the difference is around 9% over the original RTX 4070 Ti overall. These results vary depending on the title, and the RTX 4070 Ti can be quite a bit faster when its improved memory bandwidth and additional real-time ray tracing horsepower can be harnessed.
Speaking of ray tracing, let’s revisit Cyberpunk 2077 – but this time at the RT Ultra preset. The NVIDIA cards were tested using DLSS at the Quality setting, with and without Frame Generation. The AMD cards were tested using FSR 2.1, also at the Quality setting.
Yes it’s only one test, but still.
I didn’t do any additional ray tracing or DLSS testing leading up to this review, but just this one example is quite a showcase for what the dedicated hardware from these RTX cards can do. Even with FidelityFX Super Resolution enabled the Radeon RX 7900 XT and RX 7900 XTX (tested using the latest drivers) do not perform well in a ray traced workload like this.
Enabling Frame Generation places this RTX 4070 Ti SUPER close enough to the original RTX 4080 to make things very interesting, considering the $1199 list price of that RTX 4080 FE on the chart. Sure, the RTX 4080 SUPER (and its $999 price tag) is coming, but it isn’t here just yet.
Final Thoughts
This was a refreshing review. Not just because the RTX 4070 Ti has been refreshed, and is now SUPER for the same price, but because it really lives up to the SUPER branding with double-digit gains over its predecessor. This card is being neatly dropped in to the same price slot as its predecessor, bringing quite a bit of RTX 4080 DNA along with it.
You know, it’s like NVIDIA was holding out on us. They could have released the RTX 4070 Ti in this AD103 configuration, with this level of performance, all along – if they really wanted to. It would have made the original $799 price tag a lot more palatable. Or maybe they were playing chess, and now that we’ve accepted this price level they’re bringing performance in line with expectations… I think I’m babbling at this point.
The ASUS TUF Gaming card is really solid – very quiet, too.
Bottom line, the new GeForce RTX 4070 Ti SUPER isn’t just the first card in NVIDIA’s history to be both a Ti and a SUPER at the same time; it’s a solid performer with a significantly better price/performance ratio than its predecessor. We can’t argue with that. And once you factor in ray tracing performance, DLSS, and Frame Generation (if you’re into that sort of thing), at $799 this is a lot of GPU in the current market .
Grab all those AD103 dies that didn’t quite make it into the 4080, add 16gb to stop the whinging and you’ve got a recipe for a nice 144hz 1440p card. shame about the price, but hey, that’s life. Have you bought cheese recently?
My cheese habit is why I can’t buy new GPUs!