When it launched last month, the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3090 Ti took the crown as the absolute best graphics card on the market right now. It offers impressive framerates for games in 4K and 8K, and top-end performance for video editing, 3D rendering, and more. Today I’m looking at Gigabyte's take on the behemoth GPU, the RTX 3090 Ti Gaming OC 24G, which offers a more spartan aesthetic and a slightly (though only slightly) cheaper price tag compared to the MSI variant I reviewed last month. Let’s dive in.
While every RTX 3090 Ti on the market is an absolute beast, the Gigabyte version here is a slight bit different than its MSI counterpart. This one uses a two-slot bracket instead of the MSI card’s 3-slot design, though despite that change it’s actually slightly thicker in the waist, measuring 13 x 5.9 x 2.7 inches, compared to the MSI’s 13.3 x 5.5 x 2.7-inch design.
Regardless of the number of brackets used, this is a gargantuan graphics card, with a large black cooling solution that takes up a great deal of space in your case. As with any card of this size, you’ll be hard pressed to fit it inside of a small form factor case, and I’d highly recommend using the included GPU brace to prevent it from sagging under its own weight.
Gigabyte’s design uses three Windforce fans and a vapor chamber to cool the GPU, which is overclocked to 1905 MHz (slightly slower than the MSI card’s 1950MHz overclock). It’s powered by a single 16-pin port, to which you can connect three 8-pin cables via the included adapter dongle. Again, I find the dongle hanging off the side to be a bit unsightly, especially if you have custom cable sleeving in your build, but it’s an acceptable concession until PSUs start shipping with cables to fit the new 16-pin port.
Output-wise, the Gigabyte RTX 3090 Ti offers 3x DisplayPort 1.4a and a single HDMI 2.1 port, with a maximum resolution of 7680 x 4320 (8K).
Test system: Z390 Asus ROG Maximus XI Extreme Motherboard, Intel Core i9-9900K CPU (stock), Corsair H115i PRO RGB 280mm AIO CPU Cooler, 32GB Corsair Vengeance RGB Pro DDR4-3200, 1TB Samsung EVO Plus NVMe SSD, Corsair HX1200 1200-watt power supply.
Jumping straight into our synthetic benchmarks, the Gigabyte RTX 3090 Ti falls ever so slightly behind the MSI variant, as should be expected from its very slightly lower overclock. Both cards still fall short compared to the much-cheaper RX 6950 XT in 3D Mark Fire Strike, but retain the lead in Unigine Heaven.
Moving over to ray tracing synthetics, the story is the same. An extremely similar score, give or take a point, compared to the MSI card, but as we saw in the RX 6950 XT review, that card falls down the charts significantly when ray tracing is involved.
In our gaming benches, the two RTX 3090 Ti cards again trade blows with each other and the RX 6950 XT, though the two Nvidia cards take the crown over AMD when it comes to 4K – and especially so in Metro Exodus, which uses ray tracing. Meanwhile, comparing the cards to the rest of Nvidia’s GPU stack shows the 3090 Tis with a healthy lead.
All told, the Gigabyte RTX 3090 Ti Gaming OC 24G does what it sets out to do – deliver top-of-the-line gaming performance with the caveat of an egregious price tag. Compared to MSI’s take on the 3090 Ti, things are basically even, so if you’re in the market for a super-high-end GPU, either card would serve you well. That said, these cards’ absurd prices are much harder to swallow given the existence of the RX 6950 XT and the assumption that a new generation of GPUs are just over the horizon.
The Gigabyte RTX 3090 Ti Gaming OC 24G is available on Newegg for $2,149. As of this writing there’s a $100 rebate card available.
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Gigabyte RTX 3090 Ti Gaming OC 24G – Design and Features
While every RTX 3090 Ti on the market is an absolute beast, the Gigabyte version here is a slight bit different than its MSI counterpart. This one uses a two-slot bracket instead of the MSI card’s 3-slot design, though despite that change it’s actually slightly thicker in the waist, measuring 13 x 5.9 x 2.7 inches, compared to the MSI’s 13.3 x 5.5 x 2.7-inch design.
Regardless of the number of brackets used, this is a gargantuan graphics card, with a large black cooling solution that takes up a great deal of space in your case. As with any card of this size, you’ll be hard pressed to fit it inside of a small form factor case, and I’d highly recommend using the included GPU brace to prevent it from sagging under its own weight.
Gigabyte’s design uses three Windforce fans and a vapor chamber to cool the GPU, which is overclocked to 1905 MHz (slightly slower than the MSI card’s 1950MHz overclock). It’s powered by a single 16-pin port, to which you can connect three 8-pin cables via the included adapter dongle. Again, I find the dongle hanging off the side to be a bit unsightly, especially if you have custom cable sleeving in your build, but it’s an acceptable concession until PSUs start shipping with cables to fit the new 16-pin port.
Output-wise, the Gigabyte RTX 3090 Ti offers 3x DisplayPort 1.4a and a single HDMI 2.1 port, with a maximum resolution of 7680 x 4320 (8K).
Gigabyte RTX 3090 Ti Gaming OC 24G – Performance
Test system: Z390 Asus ROG Maximus XI Extreme Motherboard, Intel Core i9-9900K CPU (stock), Corsair H115i PRO RGB 280mm AIO CPU Cooler, 32GB Corsair Vengeance RGB Pro DDR4-3200, 1TB Samsung EVO Plus NVMe SSD, Corsair HX1200 1200-watt power supply.
Jumping straight into our synthetic benchmarks, the Gigabyte RTX 3090 Ti falls ever so slightly behind the MSI variant, as should be expected from its very slightly lower overclock. Both cards still fall short compared to the much-cheaper RX 6950 XT in 3D Mark Fire Strike, but retain the lead in Unigine Heaven.
Moving over to ray tracing synthetics, the story is the same. An extremely similar score, give or take a point, compared to the MSI card, but as we saw in the RX 6950 XT review, that card falls down the charts significantly when ray tracing is involved.
In our gaming benches, the two RTX 3090 Ti cards again trade blows with each other and the RX 6950 XT, though the two Nvidia cards take the crown over AMD when it comes to 4K – and especially so in Metro Exodus, which uses ray tracing. Meanwhile, comparing the cards to the rest of Nvidia’s GPU stack shows the 3090 Tis with a healthy lead.
All told, the Gigabyte RTX 3090 Ti Gaming OC 24G does what it sets out to do – deliver top-of-the-line gaming performance with the caveat of an egregious price tag. Compared to MSI’s take on the 3090 Ti, things are basically even, so if you’re in the market for a super-high-end GPU, either card would serve you well. That said, these cards’ absurd prices are much harder to swallow given the existence of the RX 6950 XT and the assumption that a new generation of GPUs are just over the horizon.
Purchasing Guide
The Gigabyte RTX 3090 Ti Gaming OC 24G is available on Newegg for $2,149. As of this writing there’s a $100 rebate card available.
Continue reading...