Nvidia GeForce RTX 2080 Founders Edition Graphics Card Review

RTX 2080 Founders Edition The RTX cards have been smashing benchmarks here at eTeknix HQ all week. The flagship RTX 2080 Ti is certainly the jewel in the Nvidia crown with its ferocious performance figures. However, the RTX 2080 Founders Edition is one of the ones I'm more excited about, promising big performance at a price point that's a little easier to manage. Of course, it also still packs new features like Ray Tracing, DLSS, and more, making it an interesting upgrade from the previous generation. Of course, this being their new Founders Edition, it also comes equipped with their brand new "stock" cooler. The card comes factory overclocked, and features a "next-gen" 8-phase power supply, allowing for more comprehensive overclocking and stability. This is cooled with their stunning new dual-axial 13-blade fans, a new vapour chamber design for improved cooling and quieter performance! Specifications For in-depth specifications, please visit the official Nvidia product page here. RT & DLSS We're still waiting on these features to hit retail games, however, it is coming. Microsoft is set to release their DirectX RT update in October. Furthermore, many developers are integrating these features into existing and upcoming games. For a full list of these games, as well as seeing some of the benchmarks that are currently available, please check out our RT and DLSS guide here, where we put it to the test. What Nvidia Had to Say "NVIDIA® GeForce® RTX delivers the ultimate PC gaming experience. Powered by the new NVIDIA Turing™ GPU architecture and the revolutionary RTX platform, RTX graphics cards bring together real-time ray tracing, artificial intelligence, and programmable shading. This is a whole new way to experience games." - Nvidia What's in the Box In the box, you'll find the card, obviously. You also get an HDMI to DVI adaptor, should you need one, and all the usual documentation. A Closer Look Without a doubt, this is one stunning upgrade from the previous designs Nvidia used. I must admit, the stock 1080 Ti design, for example, is fantastic. It may only use one fan, but it was a stunning looking cooler. However, now Nvidia has upped their game, opting for two much larger fans, as well as a vapour chamber design. This puts it more in line with the 3rd party cards we often see. Of course, this also helps with the factory overclocked aspect of the card too. The housing is cut from metal, and looks all the better for it too; no cheap plastic finishes here. The premium quality does help to justify some of the price tag too. The milled metalwork frames for the fans, the matte black top cover, and more; it'll look great in any system. Both fans are matched in regards to design, and from front to back, the care looks fairly symetrical. The card sticks strictly to a two slot design, which is good news for those tight on space. I've yet to review a single 3rd party card that isn't 2.5 or 3 slots deep. The vapor chamber and radiator stack are finished in jet black on the interior. You can't seem much of this, but some is exposed at the sides. I love that attention to detail though, as it looks pretty slick from all angles. Even the rear mounting bracket is finished in black, giving it a lovely stealthy look. Here, you will find three DP and a single HDMI ports. However, there's also the new USB Type-C VR port. The black hardware isn't found on the rear of the card, that's for sure. This stunning brushed aluminium backplate really gives the card presense, while also provided rigidity and additional cooling to the PCB. Unlike the 3rd party cards, which use 2 x 8pin, the Founders Edition relies on an 8+6 pin configuration for power delivery. How We Test Testing Procedure Here at eTeknix, we endeavour to disclose vital information regarding the benchmarking process so that readers can quantify the results and attempt to replicate them using their hardware. When it comes to our benchmarks in our reviews, the benchmarks are pretty self-explanatory although there are a few exceptions. Remember that your choice of graphics card, CPU, the silicon lottery, and other factors can yield different numbers, and there's always a margin for error when using any software. Therefore, your experience may vary. Testing Your Own System Links are provided below, as well as the settings we use. We encourage you to not just look at how one product compares to any other, but how it compares to your own. If you're looking to build a new system, you should benchmark your current PC using our benchmarks and settings where possible. You should then look at the percentage improvement from your current hardware to the hardware we tested to give you a ballpark figure of how much an upgrade this will provide you with. Graphics Card Test System Motherboard – Gigabyte Aorus Gaming 7 Z370 Processor – Intel Core i7-8700K @ 5.0 GHz RAM – Crucial Ballistix Gaming 32GB (4 x 8GB) 3000 MHz CPU Cooler – Noctua NH-D15S Power Supply – Be Quiet Power Zone 1000W Main Storage Drive – Toshiba OCZ VX500 500GB Chassis – Lian Li T80 Open Air Test Bench Operating System – Windows 10 64-bit Additional Hardware Killawatt style electricity usage meter wall plug Precision Gold N05CC Decibel meter Gaming Any technology which favours either AMD or NVIDIA is disabled where possible. More specifically, this refers to PhysX, Hairworks and similar technologies. Additionally, we also disable all forms of AA, including FXAA, to gauge performance levels which aren't impacted by sophisticated AA wherever possible. V-Sync is always disabled in our testing, as is FreeSync and G-Sync technologies or similar. Graphics card power usage set to optimised or balance, and the system power mode set to High Performance within Windows and the available GPU driver software. Identical settings are used for all resolutions unless otherwise stated. Games and Settings Used Rise of the Tomb Raider (Steam) DX12 Medium Preset Pure Hair Off Deus Ex (Steam) DX12 Medium Preset Ghost Recon: Wildlands (Uplay) Medium Preset Turf Effects Off Far Cry Primal (Uplay) Normal Preset Software Used 3DMark Fire Strike (download) FireStrike (1080p) Benchmark Unigine Superposition (download) 1080p Extreme Benchmark HWMonitor (download) Noise Everyone has a reasonable noise level preference when it comes to comes to components on a computer. Some can handle all fans at 100% load to keep temperatures down; some want an entirely silent computer. To accurately gauge the noise output of a graphics card, we position a Precision Gold N05CC one meter above our open-air test bench and take an average reading at idle and load. Noise levels in your own system or an enclosed system will likely be lower than this. Power Consumption We take power readings during idle state with no background applications running. Then again at 50% completion of the Unigine Superposition benchmark, using the average as the final published result. Temperatures We take temperature readings after 10 minutes of desktop idle with no background programs running, then take the recorded maximum delivered from Unigine Superposition after a 4K optimised run, confirming the numbers are accurate with HWMonitor. Furthermore, the ambient temperature is always kept +/- 1c from 21c. 3DMark & Unigine FireStrike Straightaway, the Founders Edition is pulling its weight surprisingly well. It beats out the X Trio and JetStream RTX 2080 cards, not by much, but it did it. This also makes it our second fastest card ever at 1080p, with the 2080 Ti taking the lead. Moving up through 1440p and 2160p, the FE fell in just slightly behind the 3rd party RTX 2080 cards, but not by much at all. Even then, it still ranks as one of the fastest cards we've ever tested. FireStrike Extreme FireStrike Ultra Unigine Superposition 1080p Extreme The same is true in Unigine, where the RTX series of cards smashes past anything else we've ever tested. The FE was ever so slightly slower than the 3rd party cards again. However, it makes a mockery of the GTX 1080 Ti with relative ease. Unigine Superposition 4K Optimised DirectX12 Gaming Benchmarks Deus Ex: Mankind Divided Moving onto gaming, and the FE proved it can mix it up with the big boys. It scored our second highest in Deus Ex at 1080p, and third highest at 4K. It just about made it over an average of 60 FPS at 4K too, which is mighty impressive. 1080p 2160p Rise of the Tomb Raider Strangely the 2080 series cards just don't seem to like this benchmark at 1080p. The 1080 Ti seemed much happier at this one, but regardless, the framerates are still impressively high. Moving up to 4K, however, and the FE quickly catches up, scoring a respectable 85.7 FPS. Of course, the Ti is the one running into the lead here. 1080p 2160p DirectX11 Gaming Benchmarks Far Cry Primal Another very strange result here, with the FE falling behind both the GTX 1080 Ti and the GTX 1080. I'm not sure why, but it's not like this card is made for 1080p anyway, but I expect drive updates will reign in this small issue. Moving up to 4K, and the older cards are quickly put behind, with the FE hitting 73 FPS average and 68 FPS minimum. 1080p 2160p Ghost Recon: Wildlands Again, nothing too exciting to report on the 1080p benchmark yet again, even if the FE does rank above the highest cards we've tested. The 4K benchmark is fantastic though, clocking in as our third fastest card to date at 65.7 FPS. 1080p 2160p Overclocking, Noise, Heat and Power It would be unreasonable to expect the Founders Edition to hit overclocks as high as the 3rd party cards. It doesn't have as big a cooler or power delivery as some of the more expensive aftermarket models. However, this edition does come with a fantastic cooler, a factory overclock, and a little headroom of its own. So let's give it a go! The RTX 2080 Fe managed a respectable 170 MHz increase on the core clock. Not as high as some of the other cards which hit 185 MHz, but still pretty decent overall. The memory maxed out with +700 MHz, which again not far from the +750 MHz some of the third party cards reached. The overclock say the score hit 23486, which is actually a little down from our non-overclocked result. However, the graphics score did increase to 28227. Overall, I would put that down to heat more than anything, and more air in, more performance out is going to be the key to success. It could also be that I got a sample that just didn't overclock that well. 3DMark Firestrike Acoustic Performance One way the FE does excel is acoustics, with the dual fan system providing much lower noise than their older 1080 Ti blower type cooler. Stock Overclocked Thermal Performance It's also an efficient cooler, with peak temperatures hitting 70c. A little higher than the larger coolers of the 3rd party cards, but still great for a cooler of this size. Stock Overclocked Power Consumption Finally, the power consumption. Now, this confuses me, as it's higher than the aftermarket cards. However, we've had reports of the new GPUs running a little rich, and expect future driver updates to address this. Take these results with a fe wpinches of salt, and we'll retest in the coming weeks. Stock Overclocked Final Thoughts How Much Does it Cost? The Nvidia RTX 2080 Founders Edition is available now directly from Nvidia. It's priced at $799.00 in the US and £749.00 in the UK. Overview I'm loving the new cards from Nvidia, and while they're a little expensive, they're showing a lot of promise. The GTX 1080 Ti and the RTX 2080 are closely matched in some benchmarks. However, when it comes to 4K performance, there's certainly an edge to be found with RTX. Of course, if you invest in the more expensive Ti edition, 4K game performance is pretty darn easy. To The Future RTX cards are just out of the gate, on infant drivers and many of their biggest features aren't even in any games yet! The GTX 1080 Ti, for example, is about as optimised as it'll ever be now. RTX series still has a lot to give, and upcoming driver updates will no doubt tap into this. Furthermore, the upcoming release of DirectX RT will allow developers to release any Ray Tracing and DLSS features to the public. It's all software from here on out, and big changes are coming. Want to know more about RT and DLSS? Check out our benchmarks and guide here. Build Quality The old Founders Edition cooler were superb, and very nicely made. However, the new RTX model really kicks things into high gear. The switch to dual fans and bigger fans at that means noise levels are greatly reduced. Furthermore, they deliver great cooling performance in addition to the vapour chamber design. The most impressive thing though is the metal housing. The machined parts of the fan mounts, the black finish on the radiator and PCIe mount, and the backplate. It's all very well put together, and possibly one of the best looking and made GPUs I've ever seen. Should I Buy One? For high-frame rate and 4K gaming, the RTX 2080 series is superb. Some of the aftermarket cards are a smidge faster than the Founders Edition. However, they're a little more expensive too. That being said, I think you get a nicer looking, better made, and more professional looking design with the FE than some of the "gamer" options on the market. With the future of Ray Tracing starting here, as well as the upcoming DLSS features, it's a good way to future-proof your PC for at least a couple of years.