Ampere Discussion Thread

[SteelCrysis]

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/nvidia...-dollar499

After a long but worth-it wait, Nvidia has announced the chipmaker's spanking new GeForce RTX 30-series (codename Ampere) graphics cards. The GeForce RTX 3090 and GeForce RTX 3080 will be available on September 24 and 17, respectively, with the GeForce RTX 3070 coming at a later date in October. These three cards boast impressive specs that will vie for our Best Graphics Cards for Gaming list.

Built on a custom Samsung 8nm process, Ampere comes equipped with Nvidia's second-generation Ray Tracing cores and third-generation Tensor cores. The GeForce RTX 3090, RTX 3080 and RTX 3070 are also the first Nvidia consumer graphics cards to come with PCIe 4.0 support. We have the architectural deep dive details here.
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The GeForce RTX 3090 is aimed at 8K gaming at 60 frames per second, so it comes equipped with 10,496 CUDA cores that feature a boost clock up to 1.7 GHz. There's also 24GB of 19.5 Gbps GDDR6X memory across a 384-bit memory interface. The graphics card has a 350W TDP (thermal design power) and requires two 8-pin PCIe power connectors.

Professional and hardcore enthusiasts will be delighted to know that the GeForce RTX 3090 is the only Ampere-based graphics card to support SLI through Nvidia's NVLink connector. This opens the door to pairing up two of these beasts together for an awesome compute machine. The GeForce RTX NVLink Bridge costs $79.99 and will be available on the same day as the GeForce RTX 3090.
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Nvidia touts the GeForce RTX 3080 as the flagship Ampere SKU. The chipmaker is promising up to double the performance over the previous GeForce RTX 2080. According to Nvidia, the GeForce RTX 3080 is capable of providing a perfect 60 frames per second gaming experience at 4K even with ray tracing enabled.
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Ultimately, the GeForce RTX 3070 will continue to be the sweet spot for gamers. The graphics card starts at $499 and delivers higher performance than last generation's flagship GeForce RTX 2080 Ti at half the price. We have the deep-dive details in our Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070: RTX 2080 Ti Performance at $499 article.
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Regardless of the model, the Ampere-based graphics cards offer three DisplayPort 1.4a outputs and one HDMI 2.1 port. Gone is the VirtualLink port that debuted with Turing. It doesn't come as a huge surprise since the standard never really caught on.

Given the power requirements, Nvidia recommends a 750W power supply for the GeForce RTX 3090 and GeForce RTX 3080, while the GeForce RTX 3070 can get by with a 650W unit. Nvidia's recommendations are based around a high-end system with the Intel Core i9-10900K so you could get away with a power supply that has a lower capacity than the suggested.

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/nvidia...ng-we-know

We don't have actual hard performance data yet, and we won't until some time in October. However, everything on paper makes the GeForce RTX 3070 look like an easy recommendation. Performance has increased substantially over the previous generation cards, and price has remained the same.

If you've been skeptical of ray tracing, and whether it's even necessary for games, now it really doesn't matter. You can get higher ray tracing performance than Nvidia's first generation hardware, and at the same time you'll get a major boost in performance for traditional rendering modes. That's our expectation at least; stay tuned for the full review next month.

We understand why a lot of people skipped the Turing generation of GPUs. They were expensive, and not really that much faster than Pascal. Besides, if you already bought a GTX 1070, GTX 1080, or GTX 1080 Ti, there wasn't a real need to upgrade. Skipping a generation in hardware — and skipping the first generation of any new technology — is rarely a bad idea. But now, based on what we've seen of the specs, features, and pricing? This is going to be a very tasty card.

Nvidia has thrown down the gauntlet with the GeForce RTX 3070. What remains to be seen is whether AMD can match or even beat Nvidia when it comes to the next generation GPUs. Big Navi might end up being just as 'big' as Ampere. We should know more by the time these cards launch in October.

https://www.extremetech.com/gaming/31448...ere-turing

There’s a lot more to talk about with the RTX 3000 series, including some of the new software capabilities and the cooling system. Look for that content in a bit. Overall, my initial impression of the positioning on these GPUs is very positive — Nvidia clearly is bracing for a fight when RDNA2 launches, and the claimed 1.9x performance improvement over Turing is going to be sharply compared and contrasted against AMD’s claimed 1.5x further improvement over RDNA. On paper, Nvidia now leads if you apply these claims against existing GPU power draw, but broad targets can’t compete with actual measurements where efficiency is concerned.

https://www.techpowerup.com/271626/fsp-r...-connector

FSP today rolled out the "Ampere Cable," an accessory that converts two 8-pin PCIe inputs from modular PSUs to the 12-pin Molex MicroFit connector standard introduced to the client segment by NVIDIA and its GeForce RTX 3000 "Ampere" Founders Edition graphics cards. The cables are compatible with any modular PSU that has 8-pin 12 V connectors that put out 8-pin PCIe. It should work with all FSP branded modular PSUs, as well as modular PSUs of other brands that use Fortron as their OEM source. FSP is Fortron's DIY channel brand. FSP is setting up web-forms for existing owners of FSP power supplies to claim a free unit.