NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 vs AMD Radeon R9 290X

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 is a desktop graphics card that launched in Q3 2020 with a MSRP of $699. It is built on the Ampere GPU microarchitecture (codename GA102) and is manufactured on a 8 nm process.

Memory

The RTX 3080 has 10 GB of GDDR6X memory, with a 1,188 MHz memory clock and a 320 bit interface. This gives it a memory bandwidth of 760.3 Gb/s, which affects how fast it can transfer data to and from memory. GPU memory stores temporary data that helps the GPU with complex math and graphics operations. More memory is generally better, as not having enough can cause performance bottlenecks.

Cores and Clock Speeds

The RTX 3080 includes 8,704 CUDA cores, the processing units for handling parallel computing tasks. The GPU operates at a core clock speed of 1,440 MHz and can dynamically boost its clock speed up to 1,710 MHz. Complementing the processing units are 272 texture mapping units (TMUs) for efficient texture filtering and 96 render output units (ROPs) for pixel processing. Additionally, the GPU features 272 tensor cores optimized for AI-accelerated workloads and 68 RT cores dedicated to real-time ray tracing calculations.

Compatibility & Power Consumption

The RTX 3080 occupies 2 PCIe expansion slots. It supports HDMI 2.1, DisplayPort 1.4a display connections. NVIDIA recommends a power supply of at least 700 W to handle the GPU's thermal design power (TDP) of 320 W.

Benchmark Performance & Value

The RTX 3080 has the 23rd best 3DMark 11 Performance GPU score among the 543 benchmarked GPUs in our database. It achieves 51.35% of the performance of the best benchmarked GPU, the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090. Its 53,713 score and $699 launch price (MSRP) gives it a performance per dollar of 76.84. This is the 40th best in value for the 3DMark 11 Performance GPU benchmark.