The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070 Founders Edition Review: Mid-Range Turing, High-End Price
by Nate Oh on October 16, 2018 9:00 AM ESTFinal Words
As we wrap up, it’s clear that judging the RTX 2070 involves the same themes that surfaced in the RTX 2080 Ti and 2080 review. First is for the forward-looking featuresets that have yet to publicly launch. Another, and closely intertwined, is the premium pricing that is based on those features, as opposed to being based on conventional gaming performance. And lastly is the existing competition in the form of Pascal, especially where the RTX cards fall in the same performance tier.
For the RTX 2070 Founders Edition, those themes are more relevant and harder to dismiss. By its nature, the card is an entry-level model for consumers interested in real time raytracing and other RTX platform features, as well as the traditional high-end card for prospective enthusiasts and upgraders on a budget. In the past couple generations, these ‘enthusiast value’ parts have essentially provided last-gen flagship performance (or better), at non-flagship prices. For example:
- GTX 1070 for GTX 980 Ti
- GTX 970 for GTX 780 Ti
- GTX 770 refresh of GTX 680
- RX 580/480 for R9 390
- R9 390 refresh of R9 290
- R9 280X refresh of HD 7970
Going back to the numbers, the RTX 2070 Founders Edition TDP and boost clock tweaks only amount to around a 4% gain over the reference 2070 at 4K. The difference is not much in the grand scheme of things, but the setup makes more sense when looking at the GTX 1080 competition. The reference RTX 2070 is faster than the GTX 1080 at 4K and 1440p by only around 10%, a gap that is easily closed by factory-overclocked custom cards.
By hardware resources, the RTX 2070 was expected to be around 75% of the 2080. But Founders-to-Founders and reference-to-reference, the RTX 2070 is bringing around 83% of the RTX 2080’s 1440p performance (and 82% of 4K performance). So the performance gap is comparable to previous generations, where the GTX 1070 brought 81% of the performance of the GTX 1080, and the GTX 970 brought 87% of the GTX 980. Except here the RTX 2080 is only managing GTX 1080 Ti level performance for traditional gaming.
Looking back at the Pascal launch, the GTX 1070 brought a 57% 1440p performance gain over GTX 970, which was substantive but with its $450 Founders Edition pricing, not necessarily a must-buy for GTX 970 owners. On the other hand, GTX 770/670 owners had a lot to gain from that upgrade.
Here with Turing, the RTX 2070 is ahead of the GTX 1070 reference-to-reference around 35% and 36% at 1440p and 4K, respectively. In its Founders Edition guise, the difference is around 41% for both resolutions. Either way, the performance lies somewhere between the GTX 1080 and 1080 Ti, except with a $600 Founders Edition price. In that sense, it offers less than last generation but at a higher price, the premium being tied to real time raytracing and other hardware-accelerated features. And when those features finally release, there's no clear sense of the quality or resolution compromises necessary to run those features.
For current GTX 10 series owners, the RTX 2070 is largely a side-grade, offering known performance for possibily worse power efficiency. For those with low-end cards, or 900 series and older products, the $500/$600 budget pulls in a number of other alternatives: the GTX 1080, RX Vega 64, or even the GTX 1070 Ti. As far as standard $500 MSRP pricing goes, for which some cards are priced so currently, it helps the RTX 2070 stay in the price/performance race, where at $600 that might be a $100+ premium over a competing product. In particular, the sub $500 GTX 1080 cards are a major spoiler for the RTX 2070, offering equivalent performance at lower price. A prospective RTX 2070 buyer will have to be honest with themselves on utilizing RTX features when the time comes, and any intentions they might have on upgrading monitors for HDR, higher resolution and/or refresh rate, and variable refresh rate technology.
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rtho782 - Wednesday, October 17, 2018 - link
I can't wait for the GTX960 review to finally come out so I can see how it compares!!Meteor2 - Thursday, October 25, 2018 - link
:-Dbtb - Tuesday, October 16, 2018 - link
Should have been compared to the 1070 TI FE imo, they dont even sell the 1070 anymore, at least not in the nvidia store in my country. 1070 TI FE is the best bang for your buck right now IMO, if you dont want/need the raytracing capapility and play at 1920x. Personally I recently bought the 1070 TI FE, and have been quite happy with it. Only cost 75% of what a 2070 FE cost, and maxes out my FPS at the resolution I play(1920x1200)TheinsanegamerN - Tuesday, October 16, 2018 - link
Just because the 1070 isnt sold in "the nvidia store in your country" doesnt mean it has ceased to exist, or that it is no longer the market the 2070 is now targeting.btb - Tuesday, October 16, 2018 - link
Well, that might be the case. But does not change that 1070 TI is much better value for money then 1070(and 2070 for that matter). The review not including the "in between" option is not helpful for prospective buyers.. all IMO of course.Death666Angel - Tuesday, October 16, 2018 - link
"1070 TI is much better value for money then 1070"Taking the Techpowerup summary of the relative performance (compared to a 2080Ti) and running it through the cheapest model available from a respectable retailer in Germany, the 1070 is less than .15% better performance/€ in 1080p titles than the 1070, 1.8% better performance/€in 1440p titles and a whopping 3.2% better performance/€ in 2160p titles. "much better value for money" looks different to me. Then there is the fact that there are 53 1070 products and only 36 1070ti ones listed here. And I have to question the sanity and your financial sense of anyone who looks to upgrade from a 1070ti to a 2070. Generational upgrades are usually not worth it without a corresponding process node shrink and the same is true here, especially since the 1070ti is more a 1080 in disguise than a true midrange card.
Kakti - Tuesday, October 16, 2018 - link
At least for me, it's not at all about upgrading from a 1070TI to a 2070, but rather which should I purchase to replace my 970. The 1070Ti is roughly $400-450 while the 2070 is $600. That's a huge difference and it's hard to know how big the performance delta is when the article keeps comparing to the 1070 that's effectively been supereseded.If you're buying a 1000 series card, it's a 1060, 1070ti, 1080 or 1080ti; virtually no one is buying a regular 1070 at this point. Honestly I think I'm going to sit out this generation until we have an idea of what this hardware can do for ray tracing and DLSS. I have a feeling these cards (especially the 2070) will struggle mightily to run those settings anywhere near 60fps. So, if I personally don't believe the 2070 will be able to deliver acceptable performance for RTX tech, then I'm leaning towards grabbing a 1000 series for (relatively) cheap.
Death666Angel - Wednesday, October 17, 2018 - link
"If you're buying a 1000 series card, it's a 1060, 1070ti, 1080 or 1080ti; virtually no one is buying a regular 1070 at this point" Any data on this? Or just made up to further your point? What about second hand cards? With a performanc/€ delta of less than % at 1080p, you are making quite bold claims here.Cellar Door - Wednesday, October 17, 2018 - link
The 1070Ti is far better value then 1080 or 1070. Your comparison uses a stock 1070Ti - a card which only makes sense overclocked(due to Nvidia banning any factory OC models). When overclocked, 1070Ti is 7% lower perf then an OC 1080 for a lot less.Oh and since 1070Ti was just launched last October, they are perfect to grab on the used market as all cards will still have 2 years of warranty left. I picked up a mint used 1070Ti for $300.
GreenReaper - Thursday, October 18, 2018 - link
Unfortunately, it's not your warranty, so you don't get to benefit from it:https://www.reddit.com/r/nvidia/comments/4xmewv/ps...
https://www.nvidia.com/object/manufacturer_warrant...
This warranty applies only to the original purchases of the Warranted Products from a retailer, mail order operation, or on-line retail store; this warranty will not extend to any person that acquires a Warranted Product on a used basis.