Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 Founders Edition Review: Unrivaled 4K 100 fps behemoth for US$400 less than the RTX 3090 Ti - Notebookcheck.net

In this review, we take a good look at the Ada flagship, the Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 Founders Edition, and see how much of a gen-to-gen performance uplift the new architecture offers over Ampere and AMD RDNA 2 flagships.

Even though it's not a complete chip, the current AD102 die in the RTX 4090 crams in 76.3 billion transistors — close to a whopping 170% increase in transistor count compared to the RTX 3090 Ti — while managing to make the die 3% smaller at 608.5 mm2.

The 4090 FE has added thickness (61 mm vs 57 mm for the RTX 3090 FE) while the RTX 3090 FE is actually longer at 313 mm compared to the 304 mm length of the 4090 FE.

The RTX 4090 FE is slightly longer than an E-ATX motherboard and will occupy the space of three PCIe slots, so you will have to factor this in during purchase. We recommend having adequate clearance between the card and the front case fans for optimal case airflow. .

You will only need the fourth 8-pin if you plan to overclock or increase the power target of the card.

The RTX 4090 FE runs at a base clock of 2,235 MHz and can boost up to 2,520 MHz in the default power and voltage profile.

It is possible to increase the power target by an additional 33% to 600 W. .

Combining all synthetic benchmarks together, we find that the RTX 4090 FE puts up a significant 51% lead over the RTX 3090 Ti and a 58% lead over the RTX 3090 FE and also with the Radeon RX 6950 XT. .

The Radeon RX 6950 XT does have a perceivable advantage over the RTX 3090 Ti in synthetic 3DMark graphics tests.

Interestingly, the RX 6950 XT is only 9% behind the 4090 FE in Fire Strike Graphics while it trails by up to 40% in other tests such as Time Spy Graphics.

Superposition, particularly at higher resolutions, shows the RTX 4090 FE completely decimating the RX 6950 XT by as much as 93% while also showing leads up to 79% over the RTX 3090 Ti.

The RTX 4090 is able to offer significantly better performance in pro apps than other last gen consumer GPUs solely due to its brute hardware power.

Gamers looking to buy the RTX 4090 will be generally pleased with the kind of raster performance uplift that is on offer compared to the RTX 3090 Ti or the RX 6950 XT.

Overall, the RTX 4090 can be up to 39%, 59%, and 63% faster than the RTX 3090 Ti, RX 6950 XT, and RTX 3090 average, respectively.

For instance, Metro Exodus (not the Enhanced Edition) shows only 5% gains with the RTX 4090 compared to the RTX 3090 Ti in the game's Taiga benchmark.

The RT benefits start becoming apparent with Control and Dying Light 2 that stand to gain by 42% compared to the RTX 3090 Ti at 1080p without DLSS.

Cyberpunk 2077 sees a mammoth 75% increase in RT performance compared to the RTX 3090 Ti at 4K Ultra without DLSS and RT quality set to Ultra.

Nvidia has been nailing the thermal design with the Founders Edition cards for a while now, and the RTX 4090 FE is no different.

In our testing, we could manage about +205 MHz on the core, +1650 MHz on the memory, and a 133% power target with the core voltage maxed out in MSI Afterburner.

Stress testing with FurMark 1.19 at 1280x720 with AA off shows that the GPU clocks fairly stabilize at 2,591 MHz at a 100% power target (power target) and this can rise up to a peak of 2,760 MHz at 133% PT with the TGP going up to 592 W.

power consumption of just 306 W in the default setting and about 357 W in OC, which is actually a lot more efficient than what we had observed with the Zotac RTX 3090 Ti AMP Extreme Holo that consumed 416 W in this stress test even without OC.

The Witcher 3 shows generally stable frame rates at both 1080p Ultra and 4K Ultra, which indicates that the card's cooling system is enabling it to perform at its full potential without throttling.

When overclocked at 133% power, the fans now spin at 65% resulting in a higher 49.13 dB(A) sound pressure level (SPL).

Similarly, at 100% power, The Witcher 3 at 1080p Ultra results in only 43% fan RPM and an SPL of 40.79 dB(A).

All in all, the RTX 4090 FE has a subdued noise profile in default settings and this is one area where Nvidia Founders Edition cards can have a significant advantage over their AiB counterparts.

At stock settings, the total power consumption from the wall in FurMark is more or less on the lines of what we had previously seen with the RTX 3090 Ti and RX 6950 XT.

When overclocked, the RTX 4090 FE can consume as much as 25% more power than the RX 6950 XT stock.

Compared to an OC'd Zotac RTX 3090 Ti AMP Extreme Holo, the total power consumption with the RTX 4090 FE OC is about 9% higher.

In The Witcher 3 at 1080p Ultra, the RTX 4090 FE actually comes across as a more economical card compared to the RX 6950 XT with the latter having an 18% higher power consumption at stock settings, which is also about 7% higher compared to even an overclocked RTX 4090 FE.

The RTX 4090 Founders Edition features the same design language that has augured well for Nvidia previously with the RTX 3090 Founders Edition.

The power consumption is similar to the RTX 3090 Ti and RX 6950 XT at stock settings, but they are still on the higher side nevertheless

The Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 can be purchased from all major PC e-tailers and brick and mortar stores across the world in both Founders Edition and AiB formats but stocks are still an issue

Currently, Best Buy is offering the RTX 4090 Founders Edition at US$1,599 MSRP but stocks appear sold out at the time of writing