NVIDIA has recently unveiled its latest addition to the GeForce RTX family, the GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER graphics card. This high-end PC gaming card was announced at the 2024 International CES and will be available for purchase starting tomorrow, January 17.
The GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER is part of a three-product series known as the GeForce RTX 40 SUPER. This series serves as a mid-life refresh for the GeForce RTX Ada family and focuses on enhancing NVIDIA’s upper-range lineup. It is important to note that NVIDIA typically releases a new gaming graphics architecture approximately every two years, and with the RTX 20-series Turing, the company introduced the SUPER brand for a similar refresh. However, this was skipped for the RTX 30-series Ampere due to the high demand during the crypto-mining boom.
NVIDIA recommends the GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER for maxed out gaming at 1440p, including with ray tracing. However, in our RTX 4070 review, it was evident that this GPU is capable of gaming at 4K with ray tracing, though some adjustments may be required in terms of graphics settings or engaging DLSS. With the introduction of the RTX 40-series, NVIDIA also unveiled DLSS 3 Frame Generation, which significantly improves frame rates in supported games. This further strengthens the case for the RTX 4070 SUPER as a top-tier gaming card.
The SUPER branding in the RTX 40-series does not bring any new features or technological changes. Instead, it signifies increased performance at specific price points achieved by enabling more shaders on the silicon or opting for a larger die altogether. In the case of the GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER, it shows a substantial improvement over its predecessor, the RTX 4070. NVIDIA accomplished this by enabling 56 out of 60 streaming multiprocessors, all 80 ROPs, and the full 48 MB of L2 cache. With 7,168 CUDA cores, 224 Tensor cores, 56 RT cores, and 224 TMUs, the RTX 4070 SUPER offers over a 21% increase in SIMD resources compared to the RTX 4070. The memory subsystem remains the same as the RTX 4070 Ti, featuring 12 GB of 21 Gbps GDDR6X memory across a 192-bit memory interface.
The RTX 4070 Ti has been retired from NVIDIA’s product stack, and the remaining cards will be sold at slightly discounted prices until stock runs out. Meanwhile, the RTX 4070 Ti SUPER will replace it and go on sale next week. The non-Ti version of the RTX 4070 will remain unchanged and retail for $550.
The GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER is based on NVIDIA’s latest Ada Lovelace graphics architecture, which offers not only generational performance improvements but also introduces new features and energy efficiency enhancements. Ada utilizes the 5 nm foundry process and introduces a new generation of CUDA cores that support shader execution re-ordering, benefiting ray tracing workloads. The 3rd generation RT core improves ray intersection performance and adds support for displaced micro-meshes, enabling more complex ray-traced objects. The Optical Flow Accelerator component assists in generating alternate frames using AI, making DLSS 3 exclusive to the RTX 40-series.
The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER Founders Edition, which serves as the reference design, features a sleek black appearance with diamond-cut edges on the X-shaped main frame. The backplate is adorned with a stylized RTX 4070 SUPER logo. Power is supplied through a 16-pin 12VHPWR power connector, which is necessary to support the increased total graphics power (TGP) of 225 W, up from the RTX 4070’s 200 W. Custom cards will transition from a single 8-pin PCIe power connector to the newer 16-pin connector.
The baseline price for the RTX 4070 SUPER, as set by NVIDIA, is $600, which is the same price the RTX 4070 was launched at. The Founders Edition will be available at this price, while the RTX 4070’s price will be reduced to $550.
In summary, the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER graphics card offers exceptional performance for high-end PC gaming. With its upgraded features and improved architecture, it is set to deliver an impressive gaming experience at both 1440p and 4K resolutions. Whether you are a professional gamer or an enthusiast, the RTX 4070 SUPER is sure to meet your gaming needs.
