The GeForce RTX 3080 (opens in new tab), which is the current performance king of graphics cards (opens in new tab), is also a stud in overclocking. The Ampere-powered graphics card (via Wccftech (opens in new tab)) has set new world recorlds in 3DMark's Time Spy and Port Royal benchmark.
Brazilian overclocking legend Ronaldo "Rbuass" Buassali pushed his Galax GeForce RTX 3080 SG to 2,340 MHz to secure the first place on the Port Royal leaderboard (opens in new tab). Time Spy is a bit more demanding so the avid overclocker dropped the GPU core clock to 2,130 MHz. Nevertheless, it was fast enough to allow Buassali to set a new world record in Time Spy (opens in new tab) as well. Interestingly, the GeForce RTX 3080's memory remained untouched in both runs so when Buassali gets around to overclocking it, the scores should improve.
Despite the fact that the GeForce RTX 3080 went on sale yesterday, some manufacturers still haven't updated the product pages for their flagship models. With the information that we have so far, the MSI GeForce RTX 3080 Gaming X Trio 10G appears to be the fastest custom GeForce RTX 3080 on the market so far with a boost clock that tops out at 1,815 MHz. So, Buassali's overclocked GeForce RTX 3080 was running up to 28.9% faster than MSI's over-engineered model. However, the overclocker was likely using exotic cooling, such as liquid nitrogen to keep his graphics card's temperature under check.
| Graphics Card | Base Clock (MHz) | Boost Clock (MHz) |
|---|---|---|
| MSI GeForce RTX 3080 Gaming X Trio 10G | ? | 1,815 |
| Galax GeForce RTX 3080 EX | ? | 1,755 |
| EVGA GeForce RTX 3080 XC3 Ultra Gaming | ? | 1,755 |
| Asus ROG Strix GeForce RTX 3080 | 1,440 | 1,740 |
| Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 Founders Edition | 1,440 | 1,710 |
The GeForce RTX 3080 has had a rocky start. The graphics card is admittedly one of Nvidia's best in the last couple of years, but its short supply at retailers (opens in new tab) has enraged many potential buyers. Furthermore, scalpers are profiting (opens in new tab) off of the situation and flipping the GeForce RTX 3080 on eBay for obnoxious prices. A recent report exposes a bot company (opens in new tab) that has helped scalpers rack up enormous amounts of GeForce RTX 3080 graphics card. One alleged scalper picked up as many as 42 units from Nvidia's online store. The chipmaker has pledged to review orders manually to look for any foul play and hopefully, puts the units back on sale.
Ampere's limited availability and the topic of scalpers will prove to be annoying problems for legit customers. The GeForce RTX 3090 (opens in new tab) lands on September 24 and the GeForce RTX 3070 (opens in new tab) on October 15. We'll probably see the same stiuation play out again. The panorama doesn't look favorable at all as Ampere's supply could be very scarce (opens in new tab) until next year.
