Introduction
Following the review of the Gigabyte Z690 Xtreme in combination with the 12900K, 32GB memory, and the 3070Ti, it is now time to dedicate a separate review to the graphics card, the Gigabyte GeForce RTX 3070 Ti GAMING OC 8G.
Specifications
Graphics Processing: GeForce RTX™ 3070 Ti
Core Clock: 1830 MHz (Reference Card: 1770 MHz)
CUDA® Cores: 6144
Memory Clock: 19000 MHz
Memory Size: 8 GB
Memory Type: GDDR6X
Memory Bus: 256 bit
Memory Bandwidth (GB/sec): 608 GB/s
Card Bus: PCI-E 4.0 x 16
Digital max resolution: 7680×4320
Multi-view: 4
Card size: L=320 W=129 H=55 mm
PCB Form: ATX
DirectX: 12 Ultimate
OpenGL: 4.6
Recommended PSU: 750W
Power Connectors: 8 pin*2
Output: DisplayPort 1.4a *2
HDMI 2.1 *2
SLI support: No
4 Years Warranty (Online registration required)
Unpack
It is time to unpack the 3070Ti. This version is a review sample, which went back to Gigabyte after the review. In the meantime, I have a Gigabyte RTX 3060 Vision OC that I can test again after this.
The advantage of the 3070Ti is that it does not get very hot, and that is also due to the three fans on the graphics card. The third (at the 2x 8-pin connection) blows through the card.
Gigabyte calls these fans “Windforce 3X” with fans spinning in the opposite direction. At least, the middle one turns differently than the outer two. This also creates a different flow on the card instead of the fans all spinning in the same direction. By the way, the fans are also pretty quiet. And that is very nice!
As mentioned, the 3070Ti uses two 8-pin connectors. Fortunately, it does sit reasonably on the right side of the card (if it is in the housing). The FEs are generally with the pins in the middle, which hides the cables just a little less nice.
As can be seen on the right, the graphics card is sort of open allowing for proper cooling of the fins.
The 3070Ti has a BIOS for an OC mode and Silent.
And here I miss the SLI connection. Suppose you bought this card for just under 1200 euros because the market was… special. Then it’s nice if you come across the same graphics card a year later and can purchase it for just under 400 euros (for example via a marketplace/eBay or wherever). Then there is enough gaming fun to be had again for the foreseeable future without ‘having’ to upgrade again in a market that may be heated again by then. NVIDIA has of course done this very cleverly, for the end user it is just a little less pleasant.
The GPU and VRAM are well-cooled by a large copper heatsink and pipes.
The following connections are on the Gigabyte 3070Ti:
– 2x DisplayPort
– 2x HDMI
Time to put the 3070Ti in the enclosure. In this case, the following was chosen: The Silent Base 802. The water cooler on the Gigabyte Z690 and Intel i9 12900K is a Gigabyte Waterforce x360.
Once the card is in the enclosure, it is quite visible that it is a fairly large card. Well, I was used to the 3090 FE and that’s no small thing either.
The card does not look out of place on this motherboard, which also has gray accents.
Do you want RGB or RGB? Yes…
The housing uses 7 be quiet! Light Wings 140mm.
Via Gigabyte’s software, the RGB of the 3070Ti can also be ‘synced’ with the color of the fans.
Gaming
As a gamer, I am of course also interested in the possibilities with gaming. And that’s actually going pretty well. Apart from the benchmarks, I also enjoyed playing Forza Horizon 5 and several other games as usual. Then you notice how nice it is to have a stable system.
To be able to play games, the Gigabyte RTX 3070Ti is used on two different monitors with two different ram sets as well.
The monitors were at a resolution of 3840×1600 and 2560×1080 (to make it very easy for me).
In terms of memory, Kingston Fury Beast KF548C38BB-16 (4800Mhz 16GB – one bar) and the Kingston Fury Beast KF560C40BBK2-32 (6000Mhz 32GB – two bars) were used. Of course, the CPU used for this was the Intel 12900K.
All tests were run 3x and an average was extracted from this. When ‘too’ big differences were observed – between the different measurements – it was run more often.
However, this was not the case.
Cyberpunk 2077
In Cyberpunk 2077 several tests have been run.
With Low, where everything was set as ‘low as possible’, medium, and Ray Tracing: Ultra.
There are three types of scores for each test. Min, Average, and Max FPS.
The scores are quite interesting, even with the Ray Tracing: Ultra it looks a: great, but it is b: not great gaming. Do not expect super smooth images as you see at 120 FPS. In this case, I would go for medium and tweak it a bit more – at a normal resolution. The 3860×1600 is a step too far for this game in combination with this setup.
2560×1080:
16GB 4800MHz
32GB 6000MHz
3860×1600:
16GB 4800MHz
32GB 6000MHz
F1 2020
F1 2020 also comes out well in the tests, after all, it is not a particularly tough game either. Even on the high (high is actually ultra high) preset, the average frame rate doesn’t drop below 167 FPS – at the highest resolution. And that’s not bad.
2560×1080:
16GB 4800Mhz
32GB 6000Mhz
3860×1600:
16GB 4800MHz
32GB 6000MHz
Far Cry New Dawn
Far Cry New Dawn also plays well on this system. On low, you get an average of 127 FPS. And on ultra 102. Even though the average is ‘only’ 25 frames different during the benchmark. Is it a visible difference? Detail on ultra is really, really good, compared to low. It is also remarkable to see that the 6000 kit can squeeze out just a little more frames than the 4800 kit.
2560×1080:
16GB 4800MHz
32GB 6000MHz
3860×1600:
16GB 4800MHz
32GB 6000MHz
Metro: Last Light
Metro is a game that you should not just use on presets, that was clear with the test. For example, it is not a good idea to set everything to the max at ‘very high’. With a minimum frame rate of 34 FPS on medium you can feel that quite a bit (and this was even after several runs at the lowest resolution. This is also explained by the Texture Filtering that jumped from 4x (at medium) to 16x (at very high).
2560×1080:
16GB 4800MHz
32GB 6000MHz
3860×1600:
16GB 4800MHz
32GB 6000MHz
Middle Earth: Shadow of War
Strange, the minimum fps are very low at every benchmark, this was due to multiple explosions in the game. And yet that’s crazy. The CPU did not scream, nor did the memory and the SSD. Again, it does teach not to follow the default presets but to tweak a little yourself. After all, we are… tweakers.
2560×1080:
16GB 4800MHz
32GB 6000MHz
3860×1600:
16GB 4800MHz
32GB 6000MHz
Tomb Raider
The latest gaming benchmark for this board is that of Tomb Raider. And this one has some pretty interesting scores. There is a huge difference between low and ultimate. At low, they turn off the screen or something. Everything looks like Minecraft. At ultimate, it is not only smooth with an average of 152 frames, but it also looks beautiful too.
2560×1080:
16GB 4800MHz
32GB 6000MHz
3860×1600:
16GB 4800MHz
32GB 6000MHz
Benching is fun and getting scores at the same time. But how does it play? I must confess, well. During games such as God of War, the 3070Ti has quite a bit of power. It is not a 3090, but you really get to deal with beautiful images at ‘preset’ high.
Conclusion
Now that the graphics cards are again considerably discounted due to the switch to the new 4 series, there is therefore also a great opportunity to quickly get a nice card. The Gigabyte RTX 3070Ti does what it’s supposed to do and therefore provides a lot of gaming pleasure.
The card itself is pretty quiet, partly due to the three fans… and that makes a big difference!
In terms of benchmarks, the card performs just fine. With the tests I was able to do, I was able to get good scores. It is equally important to see how a certain preset is set in a game. The standard medium or high/ultra setting can often be adjusted better so that even more frames can be squeezed out. In addition … a resolution of 3860×1600 is also not standard, I am aware of that. On a 2560×1440 or even Full-HD setting, many more frames can be achieved.
The next will be a 3060, again from Gigabyte. See how it holds up with these resolutions. 😀
What personally feels like a downside is the absence of SLI capabilities. Suppose you have already bought one card and then you see one for a few hundred euros.
So the price is a lot lower these days, still, it is a shame that the market has been so “expensive”. At the time of writing, this one is now €740 where it was almost double.
With 8GB you do have to wonder how futureproof it is for the coming years in terms of ‘heavier’ games. But that also depends on the resolution used. So if you are still on a 2560 or 1920 resolution in the near future, then you will be fine with a card like this.
The Gigabyte RTX 3070Ti gets 4 out of 5 stars from me.
