MSI RTX 4080 16GB Suprim X: Ada Lovelace with GPU near 3 GHz

GPU clock speeds

From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

The AD103-300-A1 (RTX 4080) is the second most feature-rich graphics core in Nvidia’s Ada Lovelace architecture, after the AD102-300-A1 (RTX 4090). Compared to the AD102, its area is significantly smaller, by approximately 38 %, and it also has 52 fewer (76) SM blocks with compute units. However, the TDP is also significantly lower, with the RTX 4080 listed at 320 W, it may be slightly different for non-reference cards.

The RTX 4080 Suprim X officially exceeds the 2625MHz GPU reference boost by 105 MHz, and in practice, (in better-than-critical cooling conditions) it reaches even higher. The table of complete parameters is traditionally reserved for the second chapter of this article, but some of the basics are worth mentioning here as well. The RTX 4080 still supports PCI Express 4.0 (this means that you don’t need a platform with PCIe 5.0 for maximum bandwidth), has 16 GB of GDDR6X memory with very high bandwidth (22.4 Gbps), a 256-bit memory bus, and a GPU with 9728 shaders (CUDA cores). And, as with all GeForces with the “RTX” prefix, the 4080 has tensor cores (304) and supports ray-tracing graphics.

One of the new features over the previous generation is support for AV1 encoding, but DisplayPort 2.0/2.1 is missing from these cards (the RTX 4080 also still uses the 1.4a standard). Although you can’t use it at the moment (you can’t connect it to anything), prospectively, the new monitors will miss this interface a bit in the next year. And it will be a competitive disadvantage after the release of Radeon RDNA 3.

MSI RTX 4080 16GB Suprim X details

More than the general parameters of RTX 4080 graphics cards, we will now be interested in how the implementation of MSI’s non-reference design – Suprim X – worked out. And this is a very large and heavy graphics card. The vast majority of the heatsink housing structure is metal, made of aluminum, and it’s a really sturdy design.

The heatsink of the Tri Frozr 3S is cooled from above by a trio of 95mm fans. What’s remarkable about their rotors is that the tips of the blades are linked in triplets. This does a good job of stiffening the critical area where the blades are most flexible and, in addition to higher vibration, eliminates the resonant frequencies that make their way into the sound of similar, but not stiffened in this way, rotors like this.

Acoustically, MSI handled it sensibly, as confirmed by spectral analysis. It says that the Tri Frozr 3S cooler of the RTX 4080 Suprim X graphics card does not rumble or hum excessively, and on the contrary, it is very pleasant. There was a time, though, when MSI had better overall acoustic expression. One thing is the impact of the cooler, and the other is how it is acoustically “spoiled” by the coils. And here it’s worse than it used to be, but we’ll get to that in more detail.

The back of the PCB is protected and reinforced by a solid backplate. It is nicely perforated at the back, in the part where the heatsink extends over the PCB, for more efficient air circulation. A little bit away from these places (by the power connector) is the switch between the BIOSes – Silent and Gaming. We’re testing with the “Gaming” BIOS, although it should be noted that there are no differences across the two here. The operation of the card isn’t more powerful, but it isn’t noisier either.

   

The graphics card is 346 mm long (not including the notch on the PCIe cap, measured from the ports to the back), which you’ll need to fit it in a case. It’s a very long graphics card, so measure everything well.

It will fit in most average-sized cases, equivalent to midi-towers of 45–60 litres, but in some cases it may be at the price of some compromises. Such as no longer installing a liquid cooler radiator behind the front panel.

   

The Suprim X card, like many other RTX 4080s, is also excessively tall at up to 75 mm. So you have to count on it blocking multiple PCI Express slots underneath. And even on some motherboards from the same brand (MSI). The Gigabyte boards that have a large shared M.2 SSD heatsink under the first PCIe ×16 slot tend to be exceptionally well prepared for tall cards. There is thus a large space from the first PCIe ×16 slot to the second PCIe slot, which does not impair the compatibility of the board even with such tall cards.

   

Due to the high weight (2370 grams), a bracket is included in the accessories, which lightens the PCI Express slot. The support with a full circular cross-section is designed well and fulfills its function well in the end.

We have already discussed the 12VHPWR adapter. Don’t worry, it won’t burn out even though the hollows used are from Astron. They are sufficient for such a load with large headroom. Still, make sure you get a proper snap lock on it and take care to plug it in straight. If you don’t push at an angle, it goes in like a knife through butter, you just have to get everything right.

   

The fact that it is a more complex connector (considering the top part with 4 pins), higher demands are placed on precision even when installing it. But when everything goes right, you don’t have to worry in the slightest (heaven forbid about a fire) and for a more peaceful sleep, we also have thermal imaging for you.

We measured a surface temperature of up to 50 °C at a maximum load corresponding to about 300 W. This means large headroom even in conditions with weaker system cooling or higher ambient air temperature.

From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Gaming tests

The largest sample of tests is from games. This is quite natural given that GeForce and Radeons, i.e. cards primarily intended for gaming use, will mostly be tested.

We chose the test games primarily to ensure the balance between the titles better optimized for the GPU of one manufacturer (AMD) or the other one (Nvidia). But we also took into account the popularity of the titles so that you could find your own results in the charts. Emphasis was also placed on genre diversity. Games such as RTS, FPS, TPS, car racing as well as a flight simulator, traditional RPG and sports games are represented by the most played football game. You can find a list of test games in the library of chapters (9–32), with each game having its own chapter, sometimes even two (chapters) for the best possible clarity, but this has its good reason, which we will share with you in the following text.

Before we start the gaming tests, each graphics card will pass the tests in 3D Mark to warm up to operating temperature. That’s good synthetics to start with.

We’re testing performance in games across three resolutions with an aspect ratio of 16:9 – FHD (1920 × 1080 px), QHD (2560 × 1440 px) and UHD (3840 × 2160 px) and always with the highest graphic settings, which can be set the same on all current GeForce and Radeon graphics cards. We turned off proprietary settings for the objectivity of the conclusions, and the settings with ray-tracing graphics are tested separately, as lower class GPUs do not support them. You will find their results in the complementary chapters. In addition to native ray-tracing, also after deploying Nvidia DLSS (2.0) and AMD FidelityFX CAS.

If the game has a built-in benchmark, we use that one (the only exception is Forza Horizon 4, where due to its instability – it used to crash here and there – we drive on our track), in other cases the measurements take place on the games’ own scenes. From those we capture the times of consecutive frames in tables (CSV) via OCAT, which FLAT interprets into intelligible fps speech. Both of these applications are from the workshop of colleagues from the gpureport.cz magazine. In addition to the average frame rate, we also write the minimum in the graphs. That contributes significantly to the overall gaming experience. For the highest possible accuracy, all measurements are repeated three times and the final results form their average value.

Computational tests

Testing the graphics card comprehensively, even in terms of computing power, is more difficult than drawing conclusions from the gaming environment. Just because such tests are usually associated with expensive software that you don’t just buy for the editorial office. On the other hand, we’ve found ways to bring the available computing performance to you. On the one hand, thanks to well-built benchmarks, there are also some freely available and at the same time relevant applications, and thirdly, we have invested something in the paid ones.

The tests begin with ComputeBench, which computes various simulations (including game graphics). Then we move on to the popular SPECviewperf benchmark (2020), which integrates partial operations from popular 2D and 3D applications, including 3Ds max and SolidWorks. Details on this test package can be found at spec.org. From the same team also comes SPECworkstation 3, where GPU acceleration is in the Caffe and Folding@Home tests. You can also find the results of the LuxMark 3.1 3D render in the graphs, and the remarkable GPGPU theoretical test also includes AIDA64 with FLOPS, IOPS and memory speed measurements.

For obvious reasons, 3D rendering makes the largest portion of the tests. This is also the case, for example, in the Blender practical tests (2.91). In addition to Cycles, we will also test the cards in Eevee and radeon ProRender renderers (let AMD have a related test, as most are optimized for Nvidia cards with proprietary CUDA and OptiX frameworks). Of course, an add-on for V-ray would also be interesting, but at the moment the editorial office can’t afford it, we may manage to get a “press” license in time, though, we’ll see. We want to expand application tests in the future. Definitely with some advanced AI testing (we haven’t come up with a reasonable way yet), including noise reduction (there would be some ideas already, but we haven’t incorporated those due to time constraints).

Graphics cards can also be tested well in photo editing. To get an idea of the performance in the popular Photoshop, we’re using a script in PugetBench, which simulates real work with various filters. Among them are those that use GPU acceleration. A comprehensive benchmark suggesting the performance of raster and vector graphics is then also used in alternative Affinity Photo. In Lightroom, there are remarkable color corrections (Enhance Details) of raw uncompressed photos. We apply these in batches to a 1 GB archive. All of these tasks can be accelerated by both GeForce and Radeon.

From another perspective, there are decryption tests in Hashcat with a selection of AES, MD5, NTLMv2, SHA1, SHA2-256/512 and WPA-EAPOL-PBKDF2 ciphers. Finally, in the OBS and XSplit broadcast applications, we measure how much the game performance will be reduced while recording. It is no longer provided by shaders, but by coders (AMD VCE and Nvidia Nvenc). These tests show how much spare performance each card has for typical online streaming.

There are, of course, more hardware acceleration options, typically for video editing and conversion. However, this is purely in the hands of encoders, which are always the same within one generation of cards from one manufacturer, so there is no point in testing them on every graphics card. It is different across generations and tests of this type will sooner or later appear. Just fine-tuning the metric is left, where the output will always have the same bitrate and pixel match. This is important for objective comparisons, because the encoder of one company/card may be faster in a particular profile with the same settings, but at the expense of the lower quality that another encoder has (but may not have, it’s just an example).

New: As of November 18, 2022, we are testing all graphics cards only in Resizable BAR active mode. There are three reasons why we will not continue with measurements without ReBAR.

The main reason is that new motherboards starting with Intel Z790 and AMD X670(E) chipset models already have it enabled, which wasn’t the case before, and the PCIe settings required ReBAR to be enabled manually. So those who don’t turn it off will be running with ReBAR active, which is a good thing from a gaming perspective where it adds performance. This is perhaps to some extent because Intel graphics cards without ReBAR don’t seem to behave correctly, and there will probably be more and more graphics cards that count on it in the future. You already know the number two reason for ReBAR-only tests.

Finally, it is also true that testing all tests twice (with and without ReBAR) with triple repeatability is extremely time consuming. However, it is still true what we have argued many times – a platform with ReBAR is less stable when it comes to measurement results. Over time, some things may change in the debugging process (from driver to driver) and may not “make sense” when compared to each other. So when you see somewhere that in other tests a slower card outperforms a more powerful one in some particular case, remember these words.

The disadvantage of measurements with active ReBAR is, in short, that all comparison tests may not always be perfectly consistent. And it is possible that there will continue to be cases where ReBAR reduces performance rather than adding to it. These are things to be reckoned with when studying results. This applies not only to our tests, but to the tests of all the others who do not retest all the older models in comparison with every new graphics card tested.

From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Methodology: how we measure power draw

We have been tuning the method of measuring power draw for quite a long time and we will also be tuning it for some time. But we already have gimmicks that we can work with happily.

To get the exact value of the total power draw of the graphics card, it is necessary to map the internal power draw on the PCI Express slot and the external one on the additional power supply. For the analysis of the PCIe slot, it was necessary to construct an in-between card on which the power draw measurement takes place. Its basis is resistors calibrated to the exact value (0.1 Ω) and according to the amount of their voltage drop we can calculate the current. We then substitute it into the formula for the corresponding value of the output voltage ~ 12 V and ~ 3.3 V. The voltage drop is so low that it doesn’t make the VRM of the graphics card unstable and the output is still more than 12/3.3 V.

We are also working on a similar device for external power supply. However, significantly higher currents are achieved there, longer cabling and more passages between connectors are necessary, which means that the voltage drop will have to be read on an even smaller resistance of 0.01 Ω, the current state (with 0.1 Ω) is unstable for now. Until we fine-tune it, we will use Prova 15 current clamp for cable measurements, which also measures with good accuracy, they just have a range of up to 30 A. But that is also enough for the OC version of the RTX 3090 Gaming X Trio. If a card is over the range, it is always possible to split the consumption measurement (first into one half and then into the other half of the 12 V conductors).

And why bother with such devices at all when Nvidia has a PCAT power draw analyzer? For complete control over the measurements. While our devices are transparent, the Nvidia’s tool uses the processor that can (but of course does not have to) affect the measurements. After testing the AMD graphics card on the Nvidia’s tool, we probably wouldn’t sleep well.

To read and record measurements, we use a properly calibrated multimeter Keysight U1231A, which exports samples to XLS. From it we obtain the average value and by substituting into the formula with the exact value of the subcircuit output voltages we obtain the data for the graphs.

   

We will analyze the line graphs with the waveforms for each part of the power supply separately. Although the 3.3 V value is usually negligible, it needs to be monitored. It is difficult to say what exactly this subcircuit powers, but usually the consumption on it is constant and when it changes only with regard to whether a static or dynamic image is rendered. We measure consumption in two sort of demanding games (F1 2020 and Shadow of the Tomb Raider) and one less demanding one (CS:GO) with the highest graphic details preset and UHD resolution (3840 × 2560 px). Then in 3D rendering in Blender using the Cycles renderer on the famous Classroom scene. However, in addition to high-load tests, it’s important to know your web browser consumption (which, in our case, is accelerated Google Chrome), where we also spend a lot of time watching videos or browsing the web. The usual average load of this type is represented by the FishIE Tank (HTML5) website with 20 fish and the web video in our power draw tests is represented by a sample with the VP9 codec, data rate of 17.4 mb/s and 60 fps. In contrast, we also test offline video consumption, in VLC player on a 45 HEVC sample (45.7 mb/s, 50 fps). Finally, we also record the power consumption of the graphics card on the desktop of idle Windows 10 with one or two active UHD@60 Hz monitors.

From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Noise measurement…

Noise, as well as other operating characteristics, which we will focus on, we’re measuring in the same modes as consumption, so that the individual values overlap nicely. In addition to the level of noise produced, we also record the frequency response of the sound, the course of the GPU clock speed and its temperature.

In this part of the methodology description, we will present something about the method of noise measurement. We use a Reed R8080 sound level meter, which we continuously calibrate with a calibrated Voltcraft SLC-100 digital sound level meter. A small addition to the sound level meter is a parabola-shaped collar, which has two functions. Increases the sensitivity to distinguish the sound produced even at very low speeds. It is thus possible to better compare even very quiet cards with the largest possible ratio difference. Otherwise (without this adjustment) it could simply happen that we measured the same noise level across several graphics cards, even though it would actually be a little different. This parabolic shield also makes sense because, from the outer convex side (from the back), it reflects all the parasitic sounds that everyone who really aims for accuracy of the measurements struggles with during the test. These are various cracks of the body or objects in the room during normal human activity.

To ensure the same conditions when measuring the noise level (and later also the sound), we use acoustic panels with a foam surface around the bench-wall. This is so that the sound is always reflected to the sound level meter sensor in the same way, regardless of the current situation of the objects in the test room. These panels are from three sides (top, right and left) and their purpose is to soundproof the space in which we measure the noise of graphics cards. Soundproofing means preventing different reflections of sound and oscillations of waves between flat walls. Don’t confuse it with sound-absorbing, we’ve had that solved well in the test lab for a long time.

During the measurements, the sound level meter sensor is always placed on a tripod at the same angle and at the same distance (35 cm) from the PCI Express slot in which the graphics card is installed. Of course, it’s always closer to the card itself, depending on its depth. The indicated reference point and the sensor angles are fixed. In addition to the “aerodynamic noise” of the coolers, we also measure the noise level of whining coils. Then we stop the fans for a moment. And for the sake of completeness, it should be added that during sound measurements, we also switch off the power supply fan as well as the CPU cooler fan. Thus, purely the graphics card is always measured without any distortion by other components.

… and the sound frequency response

From the same place, we also measure the frequency of the sound produced. One thing is the noise level (or sound pressure level in decibels) and the other thing is its frequency response.

According to the data on the noise level, you can quickly find out whether the graphics card is quieter or noisier, or where it is on the scale, but it is still a mix of different frequencies. Thus, it does not say whether the sound produced is more booming (with a lower frequency) or squeaking (with a high frequency). The same 35 dBA can be pleasant but also unpleasant for you under certain circumstances – it depends on each individual how they perceive different frequencies. For this reason, we will also measure the frequency response of the sound graphics card in addition to the noise level, via the TrueRTA application. The results will be interpreted in the form of a spectrograph with a resolution of 1/24 octave and for better comparison with other graphics cards we will include the dominant frequency of lower (20–200 Hz), medium (201–2,000 Hz) and higher (2,001–20,000 Hz) sound spectrum into standard bar graphs. For measurements, we’re using a calibrated miniDSP UMIK-1 microphone, which accurately copies the position of the sound level meter, but also has a collar, even with the same focal length.

At the end of this chapter, it should be noted that measurements of noise and frequency response of sound will be performed on most cards only in load tests, as out of load and at lower load (including video decoding) operation is usually passive with fans turned off. On the other hand, we must also be prepared for exceptions with active operation in idle or graphics cards with dual BIOS setup, from which the more powerful one never turns off the fans and they run at least at minimum speed. Finally, as with measuring the noise level in one of the tests, we also record the frequency response of whining coils. But don’t expect any dramatic differences here. It will usually be one frequency, and the goal is rather to detect any potential anomalies. The sound of the whining coils is of course variable, depending on the scene, but we always measure in the same scene (in CS:GO@1080p).

From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Methodology: temperature tests

We’re also bringing you temperature tests. You are at HWCooling after all. However, in order to make it sensible at all to monitor temperatures on critical components not only of the graphics card, but anything in the computer, it is important to simulate a real computer case environment with healthy air circulation. The overall behavior of the graphics card as such then follows from this. In many cases, an open bench-table is inappropriate and results can be distorted. Therefore, during all, not only heat tests, but also measurement of consumption or course of graphics core frequencies, we use a wind tunnel with equilibrium flow.

Two Noctua NF-S12A fans are at the inlet and the same number is on the exhaust. When testing various system cooling configurations, this proved to be the most effective solution. The fans are always set to 5 V and the speed corresponds to approx. 550 rpm. The stability of the inlet air is properly controlled during the tests, the temperature being between 21 and 21.3 °C at a humidity of ±40 %.

We read the temperature from the internal sensors via GPU-Z. This small, single-purpose application also allows you to record samples from sensors in a table. From the table, it is then easy to create line graphs with waveforms or the average value into bar graphs. We will not use the thermal camera very much here, as most graphics cards have a backplate, which makes it impossible to measure the PCB heating. The key for the heating graphs will be the temperature reading by internal sensors, according to which, after all, the GPU frequency control also takes place. It will always be the heating of the graphics core, and if the sensors are also on VRAM and VRM, we will extract these values into the article as well.

From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Test setup

Note: Nvidia GeForce 516.94 Game Ready and 526.72 Studio graphics drivers are used at the time of testing, Windows 10 Enterprise OS build is 19043.

From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

3DMark

For the tests we’re using 3DMark Professional and the Night Raid (DirectX12) is suitable for comparing weaker GPUs, for more powerful ones there is Fire Strike (DirectX11) and Time Spy (DirectX12).

From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Age of Empires II: DE

Test platform benchmark, API DirectX 11; graphics settings preset Ultra; no extra settings.

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla

Test platform benchmark; API DirectX 12; graphics settings preset Ultra High; no extra settings.

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Battlefield V

Test platform custom scene (War stories/Under no flag); API DirectX 12, graphics settings preset Ultra; TAA high; no extra settings.

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Battlefield V with DXR

Test platform custom scene (War stories/Under no flag); API DirectX 12, graphics settings preset Ultra; TAA high; extra settings DXR.

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The game also supports DLSS, but as it’s an older title and there are many tests, we will not address it in standard tests. However, measurements on request are possible if you ask for it.

From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Borderlands 3

Test platform benchmark; API DirectX 12, graphics settings preset Ultra; TAA; no extra settings.

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Control

Test platform custom scene (chapter Polaris); API DirectX 11, graphics settings preset High; no extra settings.

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Control with DXR and DLSS

Test platform custom scene (chapter Polaris); API DirectX 12, graphics settings preset High; extra settings DXR.

   

DXR (native)

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DXR with DLSS (performance)

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Counter-Strike: GO

Test platform benchmark (Dust 2 map tour); API DirectX 9, graphics settings preset High; 4× MSAA; no extra settings.

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Cyberpunk 2077

Test platform custom scene (Little China); API DirectX 12, graphics settings preset Ultra; no extra settings.

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Cyberpunk 2077 with DLSS

Testo platform custom scene (Little China); API DirectX 12, graphics settings preset Ultra; extra settings DLSS (performance).

DLSS (performance)

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Cyberpunk 2077 with DXR

Test platform custom scene (Little China); API DirectX 12, graphics settings preset Ultra; extra settings Ray Tracing on (Ultra).

DXR

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DXR with DLSS (performance)

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

DOOM Eternal

Test platform custom scene; API Vulkan, graphics settings preset Ultra Nightmare; no extra settings.

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

F1 2020

Test platform benchmark (Australia, Clear/Dry, Cycle); API DirectX 12, graphics settings preset Ultra High; TAA; extra settings Skidmarks blending off*.

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*on GeForce graphics cards, the Skidmarks blending option is disabled. This option is missing on AMD graphics cards. However, the overall quality of Skidmarks is otherwise set to High on both GeForce and AMD.

Note: The game also supports DLSS 2.0 and FidelityFX for upscaling and sharpening, but due to the relatively low hardware requirements in the native settings, we will not address them in standard tests. However, measurements on request are possible if you ask for it.

From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

FIFA 21

Test platform custom scene (Autumn/Fall, Overcast, 9pm, Old Trafford); API DirectX 12, graphics settings preset Ultra; no extra settings.

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Forza Horizon 4

Test platform custom scene; API DirectX 12, graphics settings preset Ultra; 2× MSAA; no extra settings.

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Mafia: DE

Test platform custom scene (from the Salieri’s Bar parking lot to the elevated railway gate); API DirectX 11, graphics settings preset High; no extra settings.

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Metro Exodus

Test platform benchmark; API DirectX 12, graphics settings preset Extreme; no extra settings.

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Metro Exodus with DXR and DLSS

Test platform benchmark; API DirectX 12, graphics settings preset Ultra; extra settings DXR.

DXR (native)

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DXR with DLSS (performance)

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Microsoft Flight Simulator

Disclaimer: We do not use the results from this game to calculate the average gaming performance. This is because the performance of the game often changes due to updates, and when this happens, we start building the results database from scratch. To check the consistency of the MFS results, we run a test scene with the MSI RTX 3080 Gaming X Trio before testing each new graphics card.

Test platform custom scene (Paris-Charles de Gaulle, Air Traffic: AI, February 14, 9:00 am) autopilot: from 1000 until hitting the terrain; API DirectX 11, graphics settings preset Ultra; TAA; no extra settings.

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Red Dead Redemption 2 (Vulkan)

Test platform custom scene; API Vulkan, graphics settings preset Favor Quality; no extra settings.

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Red Dead Redemption 2 (Dx12)

Test platform custom scene; API DirectX 12, graphics settings preset Favor Quality; no extra settings.

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Shadow of the Tomb Raider

Test platform custom scene; API DirectX 12, graphics settings preset Highest; TAA; no extra settings.

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Shadow of the Tomb Raider with DXR

Test platform benchmark; API DirectX 12, graphics settings preset Highest; extra settings DXR.

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Note: This game also supports DLSS and FidelityFX CAS, but since this is an older title and there are more than enough tests, we will not address this setting in standard tests. However, testing on request is possible if you ask for it.

From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Total War Saga: Troy

Test platform benchmark; API DirectX 11, graphics settings preset Ultra; 4× AA, no extra settings.

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Wasteland 3

Test platform custom scene; API DirectX 11, graphics settings preset Ultra; no extra settings.

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Overall gaming performance

We calculate the average performance so that each game has an equal weight on the result. You can find out exactly how we arrive at the result in this article.

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Performance per euro

From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

CompuBench 2.0 (OpenCL)

Testovacia platforma benchmark; API OpenCL; extra nastavenia žiadne.

Game Effects

Advanced Compute

High Quality Computer Generated Imagery and Rendering

Computer Vision

From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

SPECviewperf 2020

Test platform benchmark; API OpenGL and DirectX; no extra settings.

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SPECworkstation 3

From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

FLOPS, IOPS and memory speed tests

Test platform benchmark; app version 6.32.5600; no extra settings.

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

LuxMark

Test platform benchmark; API OpenCL; no extra settings.

Blender@Cycles

Test platform render BMW and Classroom; renderer Cycles, 12 tiles; extra settings: OpenCL for Radeon and CUDA for GeForce, the way most people will use it. OpenCL with GeForce is always slow because path tracing does not support GPU acceleration and is calculated by the CPU. Nvidia OptiX is tested separately on supported cards (GeForce RTX) and the results are drawn separately.

From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Blender@Radeon ProRender

Test platform render BMW and Classroom; renderer Radeon ProRender, 1024 samples. Extra settings are OpenCL for Radeon and CUDA for GeForce. Nvidia OptiX is tested separately on supported graphics cards (GeForce RTX) and the results are drawn separately.

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Blender@Eevee

Test platform animation render Ember Forest; renderer Eevee, 350 images; extra settings OpenCL.

From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Photo editing

Adobe Photoshop: Test platform PugetBench; no extra settings.

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Affinity Photo: Test platform built-in benchmark; no extra settings.

Adobe Lightroom: Test platform custom1-gigabyte archive of 42 raw photos (CR2) taken with DSLR; no extra settings.

From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Broadcasting

OBS Studio and XSplit: Test platform F1 2020 game benchmark; extra settings – enabled encoders AMD VCE/Nvidia Nvenc (AVC/H.264), output resolution 2560 × 1440 px (60 fps), target bitrate 19,700 kbps.

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Password cracking

Test platform Hashcat; no extra settings. You can easily try the tests yourself. Just download the binary and enter the cipher you are interested in using in the command line according to the numeric code.

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

GPU clock speeds

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

GPU temperature

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VRAM temperature

Note: If the measured value is missing for the selected graphics card, it means that it cannot be detected by the internal sensor.

From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Net GPU power draw

Performance per watt

From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Analysis of 12 V branch power supply (higher load)

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Analysis of 12 V branch power supply (lower load)

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Analysis of 3,3 V branch power supply

From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Noise level

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From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Frequency response of sound

Measurements are performed in the TrueRTA application, which records sound in a range of 240 frequencies in the recorded range of 20–20,000 Hz. For the possibility of comparison across articles, we export the dominant frequency from the low (20–200 Hz), medium (201–2,000 Hz) and high (2,001–20,000 Hz) range to standard bar graphs.

However, for an even more detailed analysis of the sound expression, it is important to perceive the overall shape of the graph and the intensity of all frequencies/tones. If you don’t understand something in the graphs or tables below, you’ll find the answers to all your questions in this article. This explains how to read the measured data below correctly.

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*With the Sapphire RX 6900 XT Toxic LE, as with the only tested graphics card, the spectral analysis also includes the sound of the water pump.

From Olympus back to ordinary mortals. Though the GeForce RTX 4080s are quite a bit weaker than the RTX 4090s, they’re also significantly more power-efficient and cheaper. And their performance still exceeds the top models of previous generations of Nvidia and AMD gaming GPUs. In addition, MSI’s most powerful model – the Suprim X – pushes the GPU clock speeds very high, while efficiency is still top-notch.

Conclusion

Unless it’s strictly a graphics card for computing, non-gaming purposes, the RTX 4080 Suprim X makes the most sense at UHD resolution. It has the performance for the vast majority of games in it, and where it is lacking, there is usually DLSS. There will probably be some takers for this card with high-speed QHD monitors, but there’s one thing to note here. With lower resolutions, the RTX 4080’s leap from past generations decreases, this is due to the CPU bottleneck (and this applies even to builds with the most powerful models, including the Intel Core i9-13900K). The question is not “if”, but “to what extent” the processor limits the performance of even a graphics card like the RTX 4080. In UHD (2160p), however, few processors are a bottleneck anymore, as you can see from our tests. At such high resolution, almost the full potential of the card is exploited even with relatively weaker processors, as seen in the power draw, which exceeds the expected 300 W.

The following evaluation of gaming performance will always be from the perspective of 4K, for which this card is best suited. Compared to the Sapphire RX 6900 XT Toxic LE, the RTX 4080 Suprim X’s increase in performance is 26 %. Compared to the lower clock speed RX 6900 XT models, the difference may be even greater, but here we’re comparing two designs that are among the fastest MSI (or in Radeon’s case, Sapphire) has to offer.

To make it as clear as possible, we will create three groups of games. One where the increase of the RTX 4080 Suprim X over RX 6900 XT Toxic LE is under 20 %, under 30 % and over 30 %. There are relatively few titles where the performance increase is the smallest. These are often games that achieve high fps even on weaker cards (Borderlands 3, FIFA 21, Forza Horizon 4 or Total War Saga: Troy). Between 20–30 % upside for the RTX 4080 Suprim X over the RX 6900 XT Toxic LE is in Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla, Control (w/o ray tracing), Cyberpunk 2077 (w/o RT), Red Dead Redemption 2 (w/ Dx12 aj w/ Vulkan API). The largest set of games is with an improvement of over 30 %. This applies to Battlefield V (w/ot RT), as well as DOOM Eternal, F1 2020, Mafia: Definitive Edition, Shadow of the Tomb Raider (w/ot RT), Metro Exodus (w/ot RT) or Wasteland 3. For some titles, it’s specified in brackets that this is a non-ray tracing setting, but we test games with it too. It’s just worth discussing separately.

The performance increase of the RTX 4080 over the RX 6900 XT with ray tracing is often dramatic, in Battlefield V, in Control or in Cyberpunk 2077, it’s up to two and a half-fold, but in the original Metro Exodus and in Shadow of the Tomb Raider it’s “only” +60–75 %, because these games don’t have such complex ray-tracing graphics. Still, with raytracing settings on the RTX 4080, the older GeForce RTX 3080/3090s lose significantly less (than the Radeon RX 69x0s), 35–45 % depending on the game. But in games with more complex RT in 4K, the RTX 4080’s performance is no longer enough for smooth gaming. For example, Cyperpunk 2077 runs pretty uncomfortably (below 30 fps). But with DLLS 2.3 (performance) the fps is already stable above 60. Something similar is the case with Control as well – you need to enable DLSS to run smoothly at maximum detail.

Of the repertoire of games tested, however, there is one where the RTX 4080’s performance is below that of the RX 6900 XT – CS:GO. The GeForce is 24% behind here,But it should be noted that at the same time at significantly lower power draw, by about 40 %.This is due to the fact that the RTX 4080 does not reach its maximum performance here and only goes to 2/3 of its maximum. The RTX 4080 Suprim X is significantly more efficient than older graphics cards in this class. At higher gaming performance, the RTX 4080’s operation is significantly more economical. The Suprim X draw “only” around 300 W (the most we measured is in F1 2020, 307 W), which is still 70–80 W below the Aorus RTX 3080 Xtreme 10G, compared to which the RTX 4080 Suprim X is 30 % more powerful. What is also remarkable compared to previous generations is that the power draw from the PCIe slot (powered by the motherboard’s 24-pin) has been dramatically reduced to only around 7 W.

For those who don’t care about gaming performance, we also have the results of rendering performance tests, for example. It’s 40–45 % faster than the RTX 3080 with the CUDA API in Blender. When rendering video with the Eevee renderer, the performance increase is smaller, 14 %. Compared to the RTX 3090, it is approximately 8 %.

In 3Ds Max, the RTX 4080 has an edge over the RTX 3080 of up to 39 %, the RTX 3090’s disadvantage is smaller (17 %). The Radeon RX 6900 XT lags behind the tested RTX 4080 by about 24 %. The overall size of the video memory also plays a role in these tests. But even where it doesn’t matter that much, which is, for example, the Energy analytics app, the RTX 3090 is down 27 %, the RX 6900 XT then about 25 %. In SolidWorks, the performance of the RTX 4080 is double (compared to the RX 6900 XT). The RTX 4080 Suprim X also has a clear edge over older cards in Autodesk Maya. However, in Autodesk Medical, the RTX 4080 already loses to the RX 6900 XT, and Siemens NX doesn’t suit GeForce graphics cards (including the RTX 4080) at all, there, Radeons are several times faster, even the lower-end models. This app doesn’t squeeze the most out of the GPU in a way that the Adobe Lightroom’s raw, uncompressed photo enhancement tool doesn’t either (Enhanced/RAW details is one of the few filters that uses RTX acceleration), where the RTX 4080 is 3 % faster than the RTX 3080. However, it is important to note here that the graphical load is always very low. Judging by the operating power draw, the RTX 4080 is only loaded to a fifth of its maximum. Similarly, not even at 1/4 throttle, it’s also the case with GPU acceleration filters in Photoshop, where slightly worse results are achieved than with other cards, which one of the new drivers may fix later on.

Information for streamers: Smaller loss of gaming fps performance than with RTX 3080/3090 is due to the concurrent capture by the encoder NVEnc (H.264) both in OBS or in Xsplit.

GPU temperatures are within 60°C, which is low. And even the memory sensor doesn’t report over 66 °C. The fans always run at low speeds. The cooler is thus characterized by a highly efficient design, but that’s why the noisier coils may annoy you all the more. It’s nothing unbearable, but MSI knows better, as they proved with the significantly quieter RTX 3090 Gaming X Trio. RTX 4080 Suprim X coils are 5 dBA noisier. The ratio of the intensity of this sound to the aerodynamic sound of the fans is shown by the spectrographs. The sound of the coils is strongest at around 1050 Hz (but it also extends into very high frequencies, as it is a volatile, wailing sound). That’s the only reason we’re denying this card the “Top-notch” award. As long as this shortcoming doesn’t bother you and you’re comfortable with the price (with a weaker price/performance ratio, which is typical for this class), you won’t find many other reasons to shy away from the RTX 4080 Suprim X. One of the reasons to reach for a discounted RTX 3090 (Ti) might be the smaller size and better compatibility with cases and PCIe expansion cards. And even then, the RTX 3090 (Ti) would have to be priced at least a third lower to make it worthwhile despite that lower efficiency for other reasons (other than the RTX 4080’s poorer compatibility with other components).

And how much beyond specs does the GPU in the RTX 4080 Suprim X work it? Eventually up to 225 MHz. Achieving such high GPU clock speeds (2850 MHz) only applies to lower workloads (CS:GO, Blender, …). With higher loads the clock speeds drop, but not too much. Even at maximum performance they are around 2800 MHz (i.e. 280 MHz above the official boost value of the reference cards).However, an environment with optimum system cooling must be naturally provided for such operation.

TL;DR: The MSI RTX 4080 Suprim X is an efficient graphics card with very high performance suitable for 4K gaming, whose only beauty flaw is the louder coils.

English translation and edit by Jozef Dudáš

We are grateful to e-shopu Datacomp for their cooperation in providing the tested hardware

• Contents
• MSI RTX 4080 16GB Suprim X in detail
• Table of parameters
• Methodology: performance tests
• Methodology: how we measure power draw
• Methodology: noise and sound measurement
• Methodology: temperature tests
• Test setup
• 3DMark
• Age of Empires II: DE
• Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla
• Battlefield V
• Battlefield V with DXR
• Borderlands 3
• Control
• Control with DXR and DLSS
• Counter-Strike: GO
• Cyberpunk 2077
• Cyberpunk 2077 with DLSS
• Cyberpunk 2077 with DXR (and DXR with DLSS)
• DOOM Eternal
• F1 2020
• FIFA 21
• Forza Horizon 4
• Mafia: DE
• Metro Exodus
• Metro Exodus with DXR and DLSS
• Microsoft Flight Simulator
• Red Dead Redemption 2 (Vulkan)
• Red Dead Redemption 2 (Dx12)
• Shadow of the Tomb Raider
• Shadow of the Tomb Raider with DXR
• Total War Saga: Troy
• Wasteland 3
• Overall gaming performance and performance per euro
• CompuBench (OpenCL)
• SPECviewperf 2020 and SPECworkstation 3
• FLOPS, IOPS and memory speed tests
• 3D rendering 1/2 (LuxMark and Blender@Cycles)
• 3D rendering 2/2 (Blender@Radeon ProRender and Eevee)
• Photo editing (Adobe Photoshop, Lightroom and Affinity Photo)
• Broadcasting (OBS and Xsplit)
• Password cracking
• GPU clock speeds
• GPU and VRAM temperatures
• Net GPU power draw and performance per watt
• Analysis of 12 V branch power supply (higher load)
• Analysis of 12 V branch power supply (lower load)
• Analysis of 3,3 V branch power supply
• Noise level
• Frequency response of sound
• Conclusion