Nvidia GeForce GTX 780 Review: Titan’s Baby Brother Is Born

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At $1,000, GeForce GTX Titan only made sense for folks building small form factor PCs and multi-GPU powerhouses. Now there's another option with every bit of panache, a slightly de-tuned GPU, and a price tag $350 lower: meet Nvidia's GeForce GTX 780.

Test Setup And Benchmarks

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Test Hardware
ProcessorsIntel Core i7-3770K (Ivy Bridge) 3.5 GHz at 4.0 GHz (40 * 100 MHz), LGA 1155, 8 MB Shared L3, Hyper-Threading enabled, Power-savings enabled
MotherboardGigabyte Z77X-UD5H (LGA 1155) Z77 Express Chipset, BIOS F15q
MemoryG.Skill 16 GB (4 x 4 GB) DDR3-1600, F3-12800CL9Q2-32GBZL @ 9-9-9-24 and 1.5 V
Hard DriveCrucial m4 SSD 256 GB SATA 6Gb/s
GraphicsNvidia GeForce GTX 780 3 GB
Row 5 - Cell 0 AMD Radeon HD 7990 6 GB
Row 6 - Cell 0 AMD Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition 3 GB
Row 7 - Cell 0 Nvidia GeForce GTX 580 1.5 GB
Row 8 - Cell 0 Nvidia GeForce GTX 690 4 GB
Row 9 - Cell 0 Nvidia GeForce GTX 680 2 GB
Row 10 - Cell 0 Nvidia GeForce GTX Titan 6 GB
Power SupplyCooler Master UCP-1000 W
System Software And Drivers
Operating SystemWindows 8 Professional 64-bit
DirectXDirectX 11
Graphics DriverAMD Catalyst 13.5 (Beta 2)
Row 16 - Cell 0 Nvidia GeForce Release 320.00
Row 17 - Cell 0 Nvidia GeForce Release 320.18 (for GeForce GTX 780)

Getting Frame Time Variance Right

Astute readers will notice that the numbers on the following page (and those thereafter) are quite a bit more conservative than the same page in my Radeon HD 7990 review, and there is a reason for this. We were previously reporting the raw and real-world frame rates, and then showing you the frame time variance data with runt and dropped frames still included. The thing is, if that’s not what you experience, it isn’t fair to then point to the raw frame time latencies and hammer AMD on them.

This is why we’re now giving you the more practical frame rates over time, along with frame rate variance numbers that match. The outcome is far less exaggerated, though still very telling in terms of the games where AMD struggles.

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Benchmarks And Settings
Battlefield 3Ultra Quality Preset, v-sync off, 2560x1440, DirectX 11, Going Hunting, 90-Second playback, FCAT
Far Cry 3Ultra Quality Preset, DirectX 11, v-sync off, 2560x1440, Custom Run-Through, 50-Second playback, FCAT
Borderlands 2Highest-Quality Settings, PhysX Low, 16x Anisotropic Filtering, 2560x1440, Custom Run-Through, FCAT
Hitman: AbsolutionUltra Quality Preset, MSAA Off, 2560x1440, Built-In Benchmark Sequence, FCAT
The Elder Scrolls V: SkyrimUltra Quality Preset, FXAA Enabled, 2560x1440, Custom Run-Through, 25-Second playback, FCAT
BioShock InfiniteUltra Quality Settings, DirectX 11, Diffusion Depth of Field, 2560x1440, Built-in Benchmark Sequence, FCAT
Crysis 3Very High System Spec, MSAA: Low (2x), High Texture Resolution, 2560x1440, Custom Run-Through, 60-Second Sequence, FCAT
Tomb RaiderUltimate Quality Preset, FXAA Enabled, 16x Anisotropic Filtering, TressFX Hair, 2560x1440, Custom Run-Through, 45-Second Sequence, FCAT
LuxMark 2.064-bit Binary, Version 2.0, Sala Scene
SiSoftware Sandra 2013 ProfessionalSandra Tech Support (Engineer) 2013.SP1, Cryptography, Financial Analysis Performance
Chris Angelini
Chris Angelini
Chris Angelini is an Editor Emeritus at Tom's Hardware US. He edits hardware reviews and covers high-profile CPU and GPU launches.
151 Comments Comment from the forums
  • CrisisCauser
    A good alternative to the Titan. $650 was the original GTX 280 price before AMD came knocking with the Radeon 4870. I wonder if AMD has another surprise in store.
    Reply
  • gigantor21
    GG Titan.
    Reply
  • It's definitely a more reasonable priced alternative to the titan, but it's still lacking in compute. Which might disappoint some but I don't think it'll bother most people. Definitely not bad bang for buck at that price range considering how performance scales with higher priced products, but it could've been better, $550-$600 seems like a more reasonable price for this.
    Reply
  • hero1
    This is what I have been waiting for. Nice review and I like the multi gpu tests. Thanks. Time to search the stores. Woohoo!!
    Reply
  • natoco
    To much wasted silicon (just a failed high spec chip made last year, even the titan) and rebadged with all the failed sections turned off. I wanted to upgrade my gtx480 for a 780 but for the die size, the performance is to low unfortunately. It has certainly not hit the trifecta like the 680 did. Would you buy a V8 with 2 cylinders turned off even if it were cheaper? No, because it would not be as smooth as it was engineered to be, so using that analogy, No deal. customer lost till next year when they release a chip to the public that's all switched on, will never go down the turned off parts in chip route again.
    Reply
  • EzioAs
    In my opinion, this card and the Titan is actually a clever product release by Nvidia. Much like the GTX 680 and GTX 670, the Titan was released at higher price (like the GTX 680) while the slightly slower GTX 780 (the GTX670 for the GTX600 series case) is at a significantly lower price but performing quite close to it's higher-end brother. We all remember when the GTX 670 launched it makes the GTX680 looks bad because the GTX 670 was 80% of the price while maintaining around 90-95% of the performance.

    Of course, one could argue that as we get closer to higher-end products, the performance increase is always minimal and price to performance ratio starts to increase, however, for the past 3-4 years (or so I guess), never has it been that the 2nd highest-end GPU having such low performance difference with the highest-end GPU. It's usually significant enough that the highest end GPU (GTX x80) still has it's place.

    Tl;dr,

    The GTX Titan was released to make the GTX 780 look incredibly good, and people (especially on the internet), will spread the news fast enough claiming the $650 release price for the GTX 780 is good and reasonable, and people who didn't even bother reading reviews and benchmarks, will take their word and pay the premium for GTX 780.

    Nvidia is taking a different route to compete with AMD or one could say that they're not even trying to compete with AMD in terms of price/performance (at least for the high-end products).
    Reply
  • mouse24
    natocoTo much wasted silicon (just a failed high spec chip made last year, even the titan) and rebadged with all the failed sections turned off. I wanted to upgrade my gtx480 for a 780 but for the die size, the performance is to low unfortunately. It has certainly not hit the trifecta like the 680 did. Would you buy a V8 with 2 cylinders turned off even if it were cheaper? No, because it would not be as smooth as it was engineered to be, so using that analogy, No deal. customer lost till next year when they release a chip to the public that's all switched on, will never go down the turned off parts in chip route again.
    Thats apretty bad analogy. A gpu is still smooth even with some of the cores/vram/etc turned off, it doesn't increase latency/frametimes/etc.
    Reply
  • godfather666
    "But, I’m going to wait a week before deciding what I’d spend my money on in the high-end graphics market. "

    I must've missed something. Why wait a week?
    Reply
  • JamesSneed
    Natoco, your comment was so clueless. It is likely every single CPU or GPU you have ever purchased has fused off parts. Even the $1000 extreme Intel cpu has a little bit fused off since its a 6 core CPU but using a 8 core Zeon as its starting point. Your comparison to a car is idiotic.
    Reply
  • 016ive
    You will have to be an idiot to buy a Titan now that the 780 is here...Me, I could afford neither :)
    Reply