Nvidia’s GTX 1080 and GTX 1070 revealed: Faster than Titan X at half the price

ddrueding

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One of the reasons I run a water cooling setup is that it discourages buying every conceivable upgrade instantly. Perhaps by the time my Rift arrives (still no ETA!?!?) they'll have a new top-end card that will allow me to go single-GPU.
 

sedrosken

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The specs are very impressive but at that price point I think I'll have to pass for a good long while. What kind of monster rig do you need in order to not bottleneck one of these bad boys anyway?

If I get any sort of GPU upgrade anytime soon, it'll probably be to a 950 or 970. The 1050 if it's out by then.
 

ddrueding

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Remaining GPU limited with just one of these would probably be a $1200 computer. 6700K, 512GB Samsung 950 EVO SSD, 32GB RAM, ~500W PSU.
 

Stereodude

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The specs are very impressive but at that price point I think I'll have to pass for a good long while. What kind of monster rig do you need in order to not bottleneck one of these bad boys anyway?
The GPU is still way more important than the CPU in gaming. An old Sandy Bridge i7-2600k with a 1080 is going to be probably impossible to tell from a Skylake i7-6700k, or one of the 8 or 10 core Broadwell-E CPUs if you crank up the eye candy settings (where it becomes GPU limited). To a point you're far better off buying a high end graphics card and skimping on the CPU if you're into gaming. IE: You're way better off with a $300 CPU and a $600 graphics card than a $800 CPU and a $200 graphics card. Depending on the game you could probably get away with something like an i3-4370 and not be able to tell the difference.

Or looking at it another way, someone with a $600 budget who's into gaming and already has a Sandy Bridge i5 or i7 should keep their SB system, spend the $600 on a 1080 instead of trying to go update to newer hardware like Skylake and end up with a $200 graphics card. This assumes they have a high resolution monitor, at least 1080p. Of course getting the 1080 over a 1070 is a totally different discussion. You're paying a lot more for what's likely not a huge benefit with the 1080. Once the cards launch in a few weeks and reviews we'll know more.
 

ddrueding

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That also depends on the game. Kerbal Space Program was CPU limited (at least up until the 1.1 release) at any resolution and graphics setup. PhysX was unable to handle all the stuff (even with a TitanX dedicated to it).
 

sechs

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First looks from reviewer-types seem pretty meh.

I'm actually more interested in what kind of magic AMD thinks that they can weave at the mainstream level.
 

snowhiker

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4k gaming = GPU limited for some time to come.

The slooooooooooooow pace of intel CPU upgrades means you can now go 5-8 years between cpus before you would gain much by upgrading.

/snark
Are we going to get 1080p and 1080i versions of the card?
 

CougTek

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First looks from reviewer-types seem pretty meh.

I'm actually more interested in what kind of magic AMD thinks that they can weave at the mainstream level.

I'm also far more interested in Polaris 10 than in either of the new NVidia cards. However, I think things will only become really interesting in ~9 months when the new graphic cards with HBM2 memory are out.
 

Handruin

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First looks from reviewer-types seem pretty meh.

I'm actually more interested in what kind of magic AMD thinks that they can weave at the mainstream level.

I don't know which reviewers you've been reading/listening to but the ones I've seen have been impressed so far. I like what nvidia's done and given the current specs are the first reference cards with wide margins on their frequencies, I suspect there is some decent headroom left for Ti versions or super clocked variants to make sure they stay way ahead of AMD. I'd love to replace my 980's with the 1080's to get seamless 4K gaming at 60Hz.
 

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The pictures on the Ars site show the card with only ONE 8-pin PEG power connector!
 

sechs

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I don't know which reviewers you've been reading/listening to but the ones I've seen have been impressed so far.
I suspect that this may have to do with whether said reviewers want to get free hardware from nVidia.

The feeling that I got is that this was more or less what folks were expecting, but they'd really like to get their hands on the cards to see how they do. The shindig in Texas was a lot of smoke and light to distract people from whatever AMD is going to say at Computex. AMD has lowered expectations pretty good, so who know what nVidia is afraid of.
 

ddrueding

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The most impressive part of it in my opinion is the lower power consumption. Going from 2x TitanX to 1x1080 would reduce my power bill appreciably.
 

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I can't decide if this is exciting or not. I feel like I barely touch what my GTX 970 can do, but then I've also plugged it in to my TV and seen 4k games slide down to barely double-digit frame rates. Shipping consoles aren't able to handle 4k, so I suspect the amount of work put in to pushing the limits of current game engines is going to be put off for another four years or however the hell long it'll take for Microsoft to release the Xbox 4k.

Maybe the interesting bit is seeing significant enough drops in power consumption to make this interesting for mobile SoCs.
 

Handruin

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I suspect that this may have to do with whether said reviewers want to get free hardware from nVidia.

The feeling that I got is that this was more or less what folks were expecting, but they'd really like to get their hands on the cards to see how they do. The shindig in Texas was a lot of smoke and light to distract people from whatever AMD is going to say at Computex. AMD has lowered expectations pretty good, so who know what nVidia is afraid of.

Which reviewers are you reading who do not want free hardware feel "meh" about the new cards? Sure their release party was a bit over the top but I don't see how that distracts from AMD. Are they even going to have a product before September? By then nvidia may be considering offering Ti versions of the 1080 hardware.
 

ddrueding

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...and some of the info I'm hearing now is discussing how many times faster a 1080 will be for VR vs. TitanX. VR is the main reason I went SLI in the first place, and I still haven't gotten my Rift!
 

sechs

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Nobody's released a real review. They're all under NDA.

I haven't seen anybody who has a good theory on WTF is up with Founder's Edition cards. They're going to make reference cards forever and charge more?
 

ddrueding

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I heard that Founder's Edition are basically the only cards to come with the reference cooler. This is supposed to be really good. Of course, I might not even test mine before sticking a waterblock on it.
 

Handruin

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Nobody's released a real review. They're all under NDA.

I haven't seen anybody who has a good theory on WTF is up with Founder's Edition cards. They're going to make reference cards forever and charge more?

From what I've heard it sounded as simple as a re-branding what they formerly called reference cards. The part that is confusing is that they'll be charging more, but you'll always have the option to get a design which uses the blower-style cooler directly from Nvidia.
 

Stereodude

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Founders Edition cards are just a way for Nvidia to fleece the early adopters. You want the card when it launches... Pay an extra $100.

HardOCP has a decent write up on them: http://hardocp.com/article/2016/05/09/nvidia_founders_edition_cards_yea_or_nay

But honest, it has craftsmanship... ;) I can't imagine their AIB partners are thrilled with the message Nvidia is indirectly trying to send. You know that ASUS, MSI, EVGA, etc. are cutting corners with substandard implementations of the chip's/card's design. Of course Nvidia is totally unwilling to put their money where their mouth is and only offers the same sort of 3 warranty their AIB partners do.
 

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I don't get the impression that all AIB partners sell substandard implementations. Some definitely do but I don't feel they all do. It is interesting Nvidia has chosen to offer a reference card for the life of the GPU revision with consistent implementation. I don't know how valuable that is to you or I but system integrators might appreciate it more. There is something to be said about putting together an SLI setup only to have a part fail a year or two down the road and being able to get a comparable replacement if needed.
 

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If you read the [H]ard|OCP article regarding the Nvidia's Founders Edition card they mention the point that these cards will continue to exist for the entire life cycle of the card. Not simply a few card produced in the beginning then quickly go Out-Of-Stock. That way the larger system builders, Falcon Northwest, Maingear, etc, can "qualify" the cards for their SFF systems and can continue to sell them for as long as the line exists.
 

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My biggest single knock against nvidia GPUs is that the cooling solutions seem to be of uniformly poor quality. They suck and die, followed swiftly by the rest of the card. Why would I want nvidia's reference cooler in the first place? Why would anyone?
 

Handruin

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My biggest single knock against nvidia GPUs is that the cooling solutions seem to be of uniformly poor quality. They suck and die, followed swiftly by the rest of the card. Why would I want nvidia's reference cooler in the first place? Why would anyone?

They chose it because of the potential to integrate into small form-factor enclosures which benefit from the blower-style cooler versus venting the heat into a tiny chassis. Modern nvidia GPUs will thermal-throttle to not cause a heat-death stroke of silicon proportions. We'll have to wait for reviews to show how good/bad this newer revised design is. I can't speak for the ones in the past as I've typically gone with the ACX coolers evga puts on their GPUs.
 

sechs

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Blowers are better for overall case temperatures because all the hot air gets dumped outside. Open air coolers are generally much better at cooling the GPU, but dump most of that heat into the case, where other components have to deal with it.

I prefer to use blower coolers because every other component in my computer is passively cooled, and an open air cooler would end up having to work against the prevailing direction of air movement in my case.
 

sedrosken

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I think it's crazy that we're still seeing increases like these from generation to generation of GPUs when we see small fractions of these jumps from generation to generation of CPUs.
 

Handruin

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I think it's crazy that we're still seeing increases like these from generation to generation of GPUs when we see small fractions of these jumps from generation to generation of CPUs.

It's not a direct fair comparison. The x86 instruction set dates back long before dedicated GPUs even became a thing. They're can evolve with specific OS's and graphical frameworks (Direct X | OpenGL | etc) at a faster pace when compared to the CPU working in a CISC environment. My point being, it's not just the hardware improving regularly, it's also the software. It should also be mentioned that the way they process data is a lot different than a CPU and also they're only now getting to the smaller sizes on the die when compared to what Intel has been able to do. I suspect they'll eventually hit a similar physical barrier like the CPUs at some point if they haven't been already.
 

ddrueding

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Another point worth making is that GPU tasks are absurdly parallel. This makes just throwing more cores at something a completely viable solution. CPUs would have made much larger strides if this was the case.
 

ddrueding

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Still haven't found a 1080 from a reputable seller that has more than the single 8-pin power connector. Based on the reviews, this seems to resolve a potential bottleneck in overclocking. I would love that card with the EK waterblock on it, but haven't found that either.
 

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Stereodude

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Still haven't found a 1080 from a reputable seller that has more than the single 8-pin power connector. Based on the reviews, this seems to resolve a potential bottleneck in overclocking. I would love that card with the EK waterblock on it, but haven't found that either.
AIB 1080's have more than one 8-pin connector. The FE ones do not. However, the chip's design is the bottleneck in overclocking. Short of LN2, better cooling and more power connections aren't going to help with overclocking.
 

ddrueding

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Do you need open loop? If not, here's a closed loop seahawk review: http://www.guru3d.com/articles_pages/msi_geforce_gtx_1080_sea_hawk_x_review,40.html

Closed loop is fine. I'm not having an issue reading about it; I want to buy one right now, and can't find a reliable source.

AIB 1080's have more than one 8-pin connector. The FE ones do not. However, the chip's design is the bottleneck in overclocking. Short of LN2, better cooling and more power connections aren't going to help with overclocking.

Really? That isn't the conclusions reviewers were reaching in earlier articles. I should do some more research.
 
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