Power, Temperature, and Noise

With a large chip, more transistors, and more frames, questions always pivot to the efficiency of the card, and how well it sits with the overall power consumption, thermal limits of the default ‘coolers’, and the local noise of the fans when at load. Users buying these cards are going to be expected to push some pixels, which will have knock on effects inside a case. For our testing, we use a case for the best real-world results in these metrics.

Power

All of our graphics cards pivot around the 83-86W level when idle, though it is noticeable that they are in sets: the 2080 is below the 1080, the 2080 Ti sits above the 1080 Ti, and the Vega 64 consumes the most.

Idle Power Consumption

When we crank up a real-world title, all the RTX 20-series cards are pushing more power. The 2080 consumes 10W over the previous generation flagship, the 1080 Ti, and the new 2080 Ti flagship goes for another 50W system power beyond this. Still not as much as the Vega 64, however.

Load Power Consumption - Battlefield 1

For a synthetic like Furmark, the RTX 2080 results show that it consumes less than the GTX 1080 Ti, although the GTX 1080 is some 50W less. The margin between the RTX 2080 FE and RTX 2080 Ti FE is some 40W, which is indicative of the official TDP differences. At the top end, the RTX 2080 Ti FE and RX Vega 64 are consuming equal power, however the RTX 2080 Ti FE is pushing through more work.

Load Power Consumption - FurMark

For power, the overall differences are quite clear: the RTX 2080 Ti is a step up above the RTX 2080, however the RTX 2080 shows that it is similar to the previous generation 1080/1080 Ti.

Temperature

Straight off the bat, moving from the blower cooler to the dual fan coolers, we see that the RTX 2080 holds its temperature a lot better than the previous generation GTX 1080 and GTX 1080 Ti.

Idle GPU Temperature

Load GPU Temperature - Battlefield 1

Load GPU Temperature - FurMark

At each circumstance at load, the RTX 2080 is several degrees cooler than both the previous generation and the RTX 2080 Ti. The 2080 Ti fairs well in Furmark, coming in at a lower temperature than the 10-series, but trades blows in Battlefield. This is a win for the dual fan cooler, rather than the blower.

Noise

Similar to the temperature, the noise profile of the two larger fans rather than a single blower means that the new RTX cards can be quieter than the previous generation: the RTX 2080 wins here, showing that it can be 3-5 dB(A) lower than the 10-series and perform similar. The added power needed for the RTX 2080 Ti means that it is still competing against the GTX 1080, but it always beats the GTX 1080 Ti by comparison.

Idle Noise Levels

Load Noise Levels - Battlefield 1

Load Noise Levels - FurMark

Compute & Synthetics Final Words
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  • whaever85343 - Friday, September 21, 2018 - link

    Whatever, this is your new benchmark:
    https://albertoven.com/2018/08/29/light-lands/
  • Golgatha777 - Friday, September 21, 2018 - link

    I just want to be able to play all my games at 1440p, 60 FPS with all the eye candy turned on. Looks like my overclocked 1080 TI will be good for the immediate future is what I got from this review. The only real upgrade path is to the 2080 TI, and at $1200 that's an extremely hard sell.
  • vivekvs1992 - Friday, September 21, 2018 - link

    Well the problem is in India retailers are not willing to reduce the price of 1080 deries.. At present the 2080 is cheaper than all models of 1080 ti.. If given the chance I will definitely go for 2080..thing is that I will have to invest in a gaming monitor first
  • webdoctors - Friday, September 21, 2018 - link

    Any mining benchmarks?

    Can I actually make money buying these cards?
  • ravyne - Friday, September 21, 2018 - link

    I agree these are really for early-adopters of RT, or if you're doing a new build or need of a new card but want it to last you 3+ years, so you need to catch the RT wave now.

    I think the next generation of RT-enabled cards will probably be the optimal entry-point; Presumably they'll be able to double (or so) RT performance on a 7nm process, and that means that the next xx70/80 products will actually have enough RT to match the resolution/framerate expectations of a high-end card, and also that the RT core won't be too costly to put into xx50/60 tier SKUs (If we even see a 2060 SKU, I don't think it will include RT cores at all, simply because the performance it could offer won't really be meaningful).

    More than a few things are conspiring against the price too -- Aside from the specter of terriffs, the high price of all kinds of RAM right now, and that this is a 12nm product rather than 7nm, it looks to me like the large and relatively monolithic nature of the RT core itself is preventing nV from salvaging/binning more dies -- with the cuda/tensor cores I'd imagine they build in some redundant units so they can salvage the SM even if there are minor flaws in the functional units, but since there's only 1 RT core per SM, any flaw there means the whole SM is out -- that explains why the 2080 is based on the same GPU as the TI, and why the 2070 is the only card based on the GPU that would normally serve the xx70 and xx80 SKUs. Its possible they might be holding onto the dies with too many flawed RT cores to re-purpose them for the AI market, but that would compete with existing products.
  • gglaw - Saturday, September 22, 2018 - link

    Is there a graph error for BF1 99th percentile at 4k resolution? The 2080 TI FE is at 90, and the 2080 TI (non founders) is 68. How is it possible to have this gigantic difference when almost all other benchmarks and games they are neck and neck?
  • vandamick - Saturday, September 22, 2018 - link

    A GTX 980 user. Would the RTX2080 be a big upgrade? Or should I stick with the 1080Ti that I had earlier planned? My upgrade cycle is about 3 years.
  • Inteli - Saturday, September 22, 2018 - link

    Are you willing to pay the extra $1-200 for a 2080 over a 1080 Ti for the same performance in current games, in exchange for the new Turing features (Ray-tracing and DLSS)?

    I'm not convinced yet that the 2080 will be able to run ray-traced games at acceptable frame rates, but it is "more future-proof" for the extra money you pay.
  • mapesdhs - Thursday, September 27, 2018 - link

    Thing is, for the features you're talking about, the 2080 _is not fast enough_ at using them. I don't understand why more people aren't taking this onboard. NVIDIA's own demos show this to be the case, at least for RT. DLSS is more interesting, but the 2080 has less RAM. Until games exist that make decent use of these new features, buying into this tech now when it's at such a gimped low level is unwise. He's far better off with the 1080 Ti, that'll run his existing games faster straight away.
  • AshlayW - Saturday, September 22, 2018 - link

    They've completely priced me out of the entire RTX series lol. My budget ends at £400 and even that is pushing it :(

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