Review – NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 SUPER Founders Edition

Despite the tight launch schedule from NVIDIA, we are finally looking at the last card to be revealed in the RTX 40 SUPER series lineup, the RTX 4080 SUPER. Unlike the RTX 40 SUPER cards we have tested in the previous weeks, the RTX 4080 SUPER is the only card that is priced lower than its non-SUPER counterpart.

Since it is a super variant card, it is normal for end users to expect significant performance gain over the non-SUPER variant but just how much gain will we see this time? We have tested the RTX 4080 SUPER against the RTX 4080 and RTX 4090 for a quick performance gauge here are our results for your reference.

Specifications

Overview

We have the RTX 4080 SUPER Founders Edition this time for our test and design-wise, it is just as big as the RTX 4080 Founders Editon. The color scheme is in line with the RTX 4070 SUPER Founders Edition – a darker tone for the cooler but the GeForce logo lights up on this model.

The power supply requirement remains the same, which is a minimum of 750W. The 12VHPWR cable is inevitable at this point, so your choice is either a new power supply with the 12VHPWR cable or the included adapter that will still work with your existing power supply, just that the cable management is troublesome.

For the display output options, you’ll find the usual single HDMI and 3 x DisplayPort.

Test System Setup

We used this list of hardware to benchmark the RTX 4080 SUPER and we’re comparing it against the RTX 4080 and RTX 4090 so we can have a better idea of the positioning of the card. For our games benchmark test, we’ve selected several AAA titles to run at their highest possible settings using the following setup under an ambient temperature of 28°C:

Games benchmark – Raster

For the raster performance, all the cards we’ve tested are more than capable enough for 4k gaming and we can easily see 60fps or more on all the titles we’ve tested. However, I have mixed feelings about the results.

At 4K resolution, although the RTX 4080 SUPER can perform better than the RTX 4080 most of the time, the performance gain is not looking great. There is about a 3-5% performance increase across the titles. There are times when the RTX 4080 SUPER performs just like the RTX 4080, or maybe worse.

The performance gain is more significant as we scale down to 1440p resolution. Then again, we can see some odd behavior on some titles i.e. The Division 2, and Cyberpunk 2077, where RTX 4080 SUPER performs worse than the RTX 4080. Since it only affects 2 of the titles, it could be an issue with the beta driver we’re using for this test and you might not experience this behavior when the official Day-1 driver is ready.

As for 1080P resolution, we still get the data just out of curiosity but you can see that not all the titles can take advantage of the GPU.

Games benchmark – RT

Moving on to the ray tracing performance, we’re leaving out DLSS 3 so that we can better evaluate the base ray tracing performance without the frame generation advantage.

Things are looking slightly better for ray tracing performance I’d say, as the RTX 4080 SUPER now performs better than the RTX 4080 in almost every title tested, averaging a 3-5% increase. Well, except for Metro Exodus, which is 5% worse than the RTX 4080.

At 1440p and 1080p resolution, the RTX 4080 SUPER performs just like the RTX 4080, or maybe worse in games like Far Cry 6, Watch Dogs Legion, Avatar Frontiers of Pandora, and Cyberpunk 2077.

Thermals & Power Draw

Now for the power draw and thermals, despite having a similar cooler design, the RTX 4080 SUPER Founders Edition has a higher load temperature of 69.6°C, about 4°C higher than the RTX 4080 Founders Edition. The fans remained mostly quiet throughout the tests but the fans did ramped up to an audible speed for a while when we first benchmark like Superposition Benchmark and 3DMark Time Spy.

The RTX 4080 SUPER also has a slightly higher rated TGP than the RTX 4080, but we are seeing only about 270W on average during gaming sessions. The stress test, on the other hand, will draw up to 370W but that’s only for a short time and this only happens when we run the 3DMark stress test using Time Spy Extreme preset.

Final thoughts

While I don’t have any issue with the performance it can deliver, the observed performance gain over the RTX 4080 is just not significant enough for the seemingly higher GPU specs. If we look at this from the perspective that the RTX 4080 SUPER is an upgraded model, it’s somewhat of a disappointment. The redeeming point, however, is the lower launch price of $999 instead of $1,199 which I think is a much more proper price.

I won’t recommend it if you’re coming from the RTX 4080 because of the minimal gain. For those who are coming from older-gen cards like the RTX 3080 Ti or lower, the RTX 4080 SUPER is still worth consideration. Not only that it a 4K gaming capable card, but you can also take advantage of the GPU for other AI-assisted tasks such as content creation, generative AI, image resizing, 3D rendering, etc.

Honestly, it’s very hard to recommend just like that because of the price discrepancy depending on which area you’re from. If you’re able to find the RTX 4080 at a much lower price than the RTX 4080 SUPER, then sure, just get the RTX 4080 because it’s much cheaper and better value. As for those who can find the RTX 4080 SUPER at the MSRP, it’ll make more sense for you the get it then.