GeForce RTX 3070 Mobile Could Bring GeForce RTX 2080 Ti-Like Performance to Laptops

By Zhiye Liu
published

Desktop performance in a laptop!

Nvidia Ampere GA104 (Image credit: NGA)

Nvidia's Ampere GA104 die (via @HXL) has emerged on the NGA forums in China. The alleged GPU is expected to power the GeForce RTX 3070 and recently rumored GeForce RTX 3060 Ti. As this is a rumor we have to treat the information and alleged GA104 die image with suspicion. 

The GeForce RTX 3070 will hit the shelves on October 15 and employs the GA104 silicon. Like other Ampere dies, the GA104 should be manufactured with Samsung's 8N Nvidia process node. The exact number of Streaming Multiprocessors (SMs) are unknown, but rumors point to 48 of them, which would total upto 6,144 CUDA cores, 48 RT cores and 192 Tensor cores. The GeForce RTX 3070 is equipped with 5,888 CUDA cores. It's obvious that the graphics card isn't leveraging the full die, which paves the way for a potential GeForce RTX 3070 Super or GeForce RTX 3070 Ti in the future.

The GA104 (GN20-E5) die from the photograph is reportedly a qualification sample (QS) that corresponds to the mobile version of the GeForce RTX 3070. Nvidia hasn't announced Ampere for mobile devices yet, so we're uncertain if the chipmaker will enable the same number of SMs on the GeForce RTX 3070 mobile. For now, one could only dream that all the 5,888 CUDA cores from the desktop variant make their way to the mobile variant.

The leaked GA104 silicon is apparently surrounded by eight SK Hynix H56C8H24AIR GDDR6 memory chips. Each 8Gb chip is 1GB in size so the GeForce RTX 3070 Mobile should land with 8GB of GDDR6 of total memory, which seemingly implies a 256-bit memory interface.

Shockingly, the H56C8H24AIR chips don't show up on SK Hynix's website. However, the original poster claims that these chips draw 1.2V, therefore, we suspect the H56C8H24AIR chips could be the low-voltage versions of the H56C8H24MJR chips.

In its Ampere announcement, Nvidia claimed that the GeForce RTX 3070 would deliver higher performance than the GeForce RTX 2080 Ti for half the price. The chipmaker's statement remains to be confirmed. However, we can't beat the excitement of seeing that kind of performance inside a laptop.

Zhiye Liu
Zhiye Liu
RAM Reviewer and News Editor

Zhiye Liu is a Freelance News Writer at Tom’s Hardware US. Although he loves everything that’s hardware, he has a soft spot for CPUs, GPUs, and RAM.

13 Comments Comment from the forums
  • Raistlin81
    The one thing about the launch of the 3080 and 3090 that concerns me is the pushing of the power envelope, meaning this generation is likely to be one where the difference between desktop and laptop equivalent GPU performance is to be quite high. It would be nice if they stuck to a power envelope and increased performance within that rather than pushing higher power use and heat generation.
    Reply
  • Phaaze88
    "GeForce RTX 3070 Mobile Could Bring GeForce RTX 2080 Ti-Like Performance to Laptops"
    Reply
  • damfs
    Phaaze88 said:
    "GeForce RTX 3070 Mobile Could Bring GeForce RTX 2080 Ti-Like Performance to Laptops"
    yeah the 3070 is already a 2080ti like and consume 30W less , that's not enough for laptops :/
    Reply
  • deesider
    damfs said:
    yeah the 3070 is already a 2080ti like and consume 30W less , that's not enough for laptops :/
    Totally agree. The performance per watt improvements are too small for any major changes to the laptop scene.
    Reply
  • Phaaze88
    damfs said:
    yeah the 3070 is already a 2080ti like and consume 30W less , that's not enough for laptops :/
    No, that's not my reason to doubt.

    1)Laptop parts do not scale at the same level as their desktop counterparts. They simple can't, due to the package and power restrictions.
    A 2080(desktop) can pull like 300w of power. A 2080(mobile)? LOL, heck no - half that amount of power, and then some, with all the variants!
    A 2080(mobile) is more comparable to a 2060/1660(desktop).

    Then why don't companies market their mobile devices to what they actually relative to?
    Who says they're required to? ;)
    Same old marketing BS, the way I see it, so they can charge more for less.

    2)Ampere is shown to be even more power hungry than Turing was, so I expect Ampere Mobile to be even more crippled on power consumption than the latter was.

    3)I haven't forgotten cpus, but it's the same deal with them.
    Hopefully Intel has gotten their act together with the upcoming Tiger Lake mobile.
    Ryzen 4000(mobile) is really good - just as fast, and even more power efficient.


    I'm not a fan of gaming laptops. The darn things are an oxymoron.
    Reply
  • spongiemaster
    Phaaze88 said:
    No, that's not my reason to doubt.

    1)Laptop parts do not scale at the same level as their desktop counterparts. They simple can't, due to the package and power restrictions.

    There was a time in the recent past when they did.

    NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080 Mobile vs NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080 (Desktop)
    "The Nvidia GeForce GTX 1080 for laptops (formerly known as GTX 1080M) is the mobile counterpart of the desktop GeForce GTX 1080. It uses the same GP104 chip and was officially announced at 16. August. The performance should be around +-10% of a non overclocked desktop GTX 1080. "
    Reply
  • nofanneeded
    RTX 3070 Mobile is the desktop RTX 3060 Ti ... With TDP of 150 Watts ...

    I doubt it will reach Desktop RTX 2080 ti ... it will reach Desktop RTX 2080 !

    Mobile RTX 2080 was a desktop RTX 2080 with TDP of 150 watts instead of 215 watts ...

    So expect the RTX 3070 Mobile to be the same performance of DESKTOP RTX 2080.
    Reply
  • Olle P
    Raistlin81 said:
    ... It would be nice if they stuck to a power envelope and increased performance within that...
    Yes it would. But Nvidia didn't go very far in that direction this time. I expect RDNA2 to be a longer step in efficiency.

    damfs said:
    yeah the 3070 is already a 2080ti like and consume 30W less , that's not enough for laptops :/
    That's also my thought. The Mobile 3070 might beat the 2080 Ti Mobile though...

    spongiemaster said:
    There was a time in the recent past when they did.
    "The Nvidia GeForce GTX 1080 for laptops (formerly known as GTX 1080M) ... The performance should be around +-10% of a non overclocked desktop GTX 1080."
    They can reduce power consumption by binning based on voltage requirement.
    Reduce the clocks a little.
    Reduce the voltage.
    Cut off boost frequency faster, and possibly not go quite as high.Then you can have about the same performance at some specific loads.
    Reply
  • excalibur1814
    The oems can barely cool a 1060, let alone anything else. How many reviews have we all read that features the word, 'throttling'? So damn many.
    Reply
  • sizzling
    excalibur1814 said:
    The oems can barely cool a 1060, let alone anything else. How many reviews have we all read that features the word, 'throttling'? So damn many.
    My Dell G5 with 2060 has no problem keeping the gpu at 75c but the i7 9750h is a different story. That cpu needs undervolting to tame it and get it into low 80’s otherwise it will run at high 90’s.
    Reply