It would seem that Nvidia might have encountered a setback leading up to the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti's release. According to a message posted on the Board Channels forums, the chipmaker has purportedly pushed the launch date to mid-May. The GeForce RTX 3080 Ti was previously rumored to debut in mid-April.
The GeForce RTX 3090 and the Radeon RX 6900 XT are the two of the best graphics cards on the market right now. The truth of the matter is that neither flagship is cheap or in stock. The GeForce RTX 3090 retails for $1,499, while the Radeon RX 6900 XT sells for $999 if you can find one outside of eBay (see our GPU price index). The general consensus is that Nvidia is cooking up the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti to compete with the Radeon RX 6900 XT at the $999 price bracket. In order for that to happen, the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti's performance would have to be on equal grounds or better than the Radeon RX 6900 XT.
Nvidia has gone to lengths to keep the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti under wraps, but it presumably takes after the GeForce RTX 3090. It's probable that the graphics card uses the same GA102 silicon. There is speculation that the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti comes equipped with 82 Streaming Multiprocessors (SMs), same as the GeForce RTX 3090. However, there's another group that thinks that Nvidia might disable two SMs to bring the CUDA count down to 10,240. The latter seems reasonable since Nvidia wouldn't want the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti's performance to be too close to the flagship SKU.
Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 Ti Specifications
| Header Cell - Column 0 | GeForce RTX 3090 | GeForce RTX 3080 Ti* | GeForce RTX 3080 | GeForce RTX 3070 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Architecture (GPU) | Ampere (GA102) | Ampere (GA102) | Ampere (GA102) | Ampere (GA104) |
| CUDA Cores / SP | 10,496 | 10,496 / 10,240 | 8,704 | 5,888 |
| RT Cores | 82 | 82 / 80 | 68 | 46 |
| Tensor Cores | 328 | 328 / 320 | 272 | 184 |
| Texture Units | 328 | 328 / 320 | 272 | 184 |
| Base Clock Rate | 1,395 MHz | 1,365 MHz | 1,440 MHz | 1,500 MHz |
| Boost Clock Rate | 1,695 MHz | 1,665 MHz | 1,710 MHz | 1,730 MHz |
| Memory Capacity | 24GB GDDR6X | 12GB GDDR6X | 10GB GDDR6X | 8GB GDDR6 |
| Memory Speed | 19.5 Gbps | 19 Gbps | 19 Gbps | 14 Gbps |
| Memory Bus | 384-bit | 384-bit | 320-bit | 256-bit |
| Memory Bandwidth | 936 GBps | 912.4 GBps | 760 GBps | 448 GBps |
| ROPs | 112 | 112 | 96 | 96 |
| L2 Cache | 6MB | 6MB | 5MB | 4MB |
| TDP | 350W | 350 | 320W | 220W |
| Transistor Count | 28.3 billion | 28.3 billion | 28.3 billion | 17.4 billion |
| Die Size | 628 mm² | 628 mm² | 628 mm² | 392 mm² |
| MSRP | $1,499 | $999 | $699 | $499 |
*Specifications are unconfirmed.
Reputable hardware leaker kopite7kimi reported that the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti could feature a 1,665 MHz boost clock, 30 MHz lower than the GeForce RTX 3090. If Nvidia applies the same treatment to the base clock then the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti should check in at 1,365 MHz.
On the memory front, the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti reportedly features 12GB of 19 Gbps GDDR6X memory, half of what's on the GeForce RTX 3090 and slightly slower. However, it may still retain the 384-bit memory interface. If so, the memory bandwidth would peak around 912.4 GBps. The GeForce RTX 3090 delivers a hash rate up to 106.5 MH/s on Ethereum so it'll be interesting to see just how the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti performs in mining Ethereum.
Previous Ampere launches have taught us that intial supply is extremely limited, and we don't expect the situation to change with the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti. It'll probably require a miracle to beat scalpers to one, much less find it at the rumored $999 price tag. Let's hope that the extra month gives Nvidia enough time to build up its GeForce RTX 3080 Ti stock. If not, it's time to pull another all-nighter continuously hitting that F5 button in hope to snag one away from the scalpers.
