Release date, prices and features

Next generation Nvidia finally.

It’s been a while since we’ve seen the new cards from Nvidia. But now the manufacturer has announced the release of the GeForce RTX 2080 at Gamescom 2018 in Cologne, Germany.

The first thing we mentioned about the new graphics card involved a leaked product page at Nvidia’s own press conference at the show alongside the RTX 2080 Ti and RTX 2070.

With the release of the RTX 2080, it became clear that Gamescom showed everything there was to know – before that we had only seen speculation and rumors. We didn’t know if the RTX 2080 would be based on the Volta architecture (the architecture that some high-end graphics cards have been using for several months), Ampere or Turing, as it turns out, the GeForce RTX 2080 comes on the latter.

Read: Nvidia GeForce RTX 2080 Ti Review

Thankfully, Nvidia has lifted the veil on the RTX 2080 powered by Turing GPUs.

Even with recent rumors of what might be on display, there has been confusion over the names of the RTX 2080. For a long time, all rumors have pointed to the next GPU being the GTX 1180 – until recently. We are now confident that this is the RTX 2080.

In pursuit!

• What is it? New flagship Nvidia graphics card
• When to expect? September 20, 2018;
• How much is? $ 699 (42,000 rubles);

| NVIDIA GEFORCE RTX 2080: RELEASE DATE

All speculation about the next generation of Nvidia graphics cards seems to have come together at Gamescom 2018.The 20-year-old Nvidia has released a promotional video hinting at the August 20 release on Gaemscom.

Now, with all the rumors and leaks behind us, we know for sure that three Nvidia RTX 20 Series graphics cards, including the RTX 2080, will go on sale on September 20.

This means that video cards will be available in stores and for orders on this day, and pre-orders will be accepted from August 20, and the owners will come on the same day: September 20.

| NVIDIA GEFORCE RTX 2080: PRICES

The numbers may sound a little tricky, as Nvidia currently mentions different prices for the new RTX graphics cards. There are prices that Nvidia CEO Jen-sen Huang announced from the stage and those that were found on Nvidia’s own site. Here’s what Juan said from the stage:

• Nvidia GeForce RTX 2080 Ti: $ 999 (about $ 65,000);
• Nvidia GeForce RTX 2080: $ 699 (about $ 45,000);
• Nvidia GeForce RTX 2070: $ 499 (about $ 32,500);

Now, here are the prices listed on Nvidia’s site, meaning they are for pre-ordering the RTX 2080 and 2080 Ti right now. Prices are higher:

• Nvidia GeForce RTX 2080 Ti: $ 1199 (about 78,000 rubles)
• Nvidia GeForce RTX 2080: $ 799 (about 52,000 rubles)
• Nvidia GeForce RTX 2070: $ 599 (about 39,000 rubles)

For reference, the Nvidia GeForce GTX 1080 Ti and Nvidia GTX 1080 came with a starting price of $ 699 (about $ 45,500) and $ 599 (about $ 39,000), respectively.

Read: Nvidia GeForce RTX 2080: Worth The Upgrade?

Thus, no matter what the real price is, video cards are significantly more expensive than previous releases. Probably because Nvidia spends a lot of effort advertising ray tracing and the benefits of this technology as it is a key feature of new graphics cards.

| NVIDIA GEFORCE RTX 2080: CHARACTERISTICS

And this is the most exciting part of the article. In May, the specs of the Nvidia GeForce RTX 2080 were highlighted in the TechPowerUp GPU database, and they looked promising. However, we now know the true characteristics and while they are still impressive, we have to reevaluate expectations.

The Nvidia GeForce RTX 2080 was expected to be more powerful than even the Nvidia Titan Xp, the most powerful consumer graphics card on the market right now. On paper, however, this is not necessarily the case – the Titan Xp still offers more CUDA cores and more video memory capacity.

Here’s how the RTX 2080 performs in the most important specs: clock speed, video memory size, and video memory speed:

As you can see, Nvidia is offering the Founders Edition graphics card to early adopters, pulling up on processor speeds. You can order a video card right now. The base model RTX 2080 has a slightly lower clock speed than its predecessor, the GTX 1080.

However, the new graphics card offers new and significantly improved GDDR6 video memory that operates at data transfer rates up to 4 Gbps.

Additionally, Nvidia is not targeting data rates with new graphics cards, but rather the technology that Turing GPUs implement – in particular, real-time ray tracing and machine learning for advanced rendering.

The RTX 2080 supports the latest video rendering and output standards as well as Serial SLI graphics cards, relying on an optional Nvidia RTX NVLink Bridge for $ 79. The video card can support up to 8K (7860 x 4320) and consumes 215 watts of power.

Most likely, with a new video card, you will need to update at least one more component in order for everything to work smoothly, namely, most likely your power supply will not be able to offer the required power.

Read: Best PC Power Supplies

We have yet to put the Nvidia RTX 2080 in perspective – stay tuned for updates, related information, and full coverage.