So, the rumors were true. NVIDIA announced today a GeForce RTX 3080 12GB graphics card variant. It’s a refresh or beef-up version of the RTX 3080 released more than a year ago. I wonder why NVIDIA didn’t announce this during their CES 2022 presentation. NVIDIA only announced the RTX 3090 Ti and RTX 3050 during the said event. The RTX 3080 12GB features more memory and slightly improved or better specs than the RTX 3080 10GB. But at what cost?
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 12GB Graphics Card Released
The new GeForce RTX 3080 12GB variant is based on the same Samsung 8nm GA102 GPU like the RTX 3080 and RTX 3080 Ti. But it’s a slightly different variant and with slightly improved specifications. For starters, it features 8960 CUDA cores, which is 256 more cores than the RTX 3080 10GB. The Tensor cores and RT cores were also slightly improved, now come with 280 and 70 cores respectively.
The RTX 3080 12GB, obviously, gets 12GB of GDDR6X memory. That’s 2GB more than the RTX 3080 and is similar to the RTX 3080 Ti in size and bus width (384-bit). It has a memory speed of 19Gbps, similar to the RTX 3080 and 3080 Ti. Its thermal graphics power design is increased to 350W, 20W more than the RTX 3080’s TGP.
The only things that are not clear at this point are the base and boost clock speeds. However, I believe that it won’t be far or perhaps similar with the RTX 3080 Ti or perhaps with the RTX 3080 10GB. There are no reviews as of today yet. Expect reviews for the RTX 3080 12GB to go live in the next following days or next week perhaps.
When it comes to performance, based on the specs alone, it will be performing somewhere in between the RTX 3080 (review here) and RTX 3080 Ti (review here). After all, it’s an improved RTX 3080 10GB, but will not be as fast are the 3080 Ti. The performance isn’t the main concern here. Like with all graphics cards, the main issue is the pricing and availability.
GeForce RTX 3080 12GB Price – How Much Will It Cost?
The RTX 3080 10GB came with an original MSRP of $699 and the RTX 3080 Ti at $1,199. More or less the MSRP for the RTX 3080 12GB is around $800-$1,000. But the actual retail price is expected to be way higher than that.
Retail prices for the RTX 3080 12GB could be ranging from $1,500 to $1,700 or perhaps, even more, depending on the scarcity. EVGA listed its 3080 XC3 Ultra 12GB and 3080 FTW3 Ultra 12GB at $1,249 and $1,299 respectively. But those are MSRP as well.
I’m pretty sure at this point, most PC enthusiasts and PC gamers are not excited about the new release. Heck, the RTX 3090 Ti and RTX 3050 weren’t that exciting as well. Until pricing and availability are resolved, we might be in this state for a while.
