Nvidia announced it’s much awaited GeForce RTX 4090 and GeForce RTX 4080 at GTC 2022 keynote. Taking full advantage of its new “Ada Lovelace” architecture, NVIDIA says the two GPUs offer significantly better ray tracing performance. The company worked with Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) to co-develop a new “4N” fabrication process that NVIDIA says is up to two times more power efficient than the 8nm process it used for its 30 Series cards.

The new cards will have 76 billion transistors and feature a new technology called Shader Execution Reordering (SER), which promises to boost ray-tracing performance by up to x3. They will also feature a new Tensor Core type with greater tensor processing. These GPUs promise at least a 25% increase in gaming performance thanks to SER.

How big is the RTX 4090?

GPU Engine Specs:NVIDIA CUDA® Cores16384
Boost Clock (GHz)2.52
Base Clock (GHz)2.23
Memory Specs:Standard Memory Config24 GB GDDR6X
Memory Interface Width384-bit
Technology Support:Ray Tracing Cores3rd Generation
Tensor Cores4th Generation
NVIDIA ArchitectureAda Lovelace
NVIDIA DLSS3
NVIDIA ReflexYes
NVIDIA BroadcastYes
PCI Express Gen 4Yes
Resizable BARYes
NVIDIA® GeForce ExperienceYes
NVIDIA AnselYes
NVIDIA FreeStyleYes
NVIDIA ShadowPlayYes
NVIDIA HighlightsYes
NVIDIA G-SYNC®Yes
Game Ready DriversYes
NVIDIA Studio DriversYes
NVIDIA OmniverseYes
Microsoft DirectX® 12 UltimateYes
NVIDIA GPU BoostYes
NVIDIA NVLink (SLI-Ready)No
Vulkan RT API, OpenGL 4.6Yes
NVIDIA Encoder (NVENC)2x 8th Generation
NVIDIA Decoder (NVDEC)5th Generation
AV1 EncodeYes
AV1 DecodeYes
CUDA Capability8.9
VR ReadyYes
Display Support:Maximum Digital Resolution (1)7680×4320
Standard Display ConnectorsHDMI(2), 3x DisplayPort(3)
Multi Monitor4
HDCP2.3
Card Dimensions:Length304 mm
Width137 mm
Slots3-Slot (61mm)
Thermal and Power Specs:Maximum GPU Temperature (in C)90
Graphics Card Power (W)450 W
Minimum System Power (W) (4)850 W
Supplementary Power Connectors3x PCIe 8-pin cables (adapter in box) OR
450 W or greater PCIe Gen 5 cable

In terms of performance, the 16GB 4080 features 9,728 Cuda Cores and a base clock of 2.21GHz, with a maximum boost clock of 2.51GHz. Meanwhile, the 12GB model features a more modest 7,680 CUDA Cores but 100MHz faster base and boost clocks.

NVIDIA’s 40 Series GPUs arrive at a difficult time for the company. For much of the pandemic, it was impossible to buy the latest GeForce GPUs at MSRP due to demand from both gamers and crypto miners. That all changed in recent months due to the recent crypto crash and Ethereum’s much-anticipated switch to proof-of-stake minting. As a result of those events, the used market was flooded with 30 series GPUs, making it nearly impossible for the company’s AIB partners and retailers to sell new video cards at MSRP.

How much will the RTX 4090 cost?

The first of NVIDIA’s new Ada Lovelace GPUs will arrive next month when the GeForce RTX 4090 goes on for sale for $1,599 on October 12th. With 24GB of GDDR6X memory, NVIDIA claims its latest flagship is two to four times faster than the 3090 Ti while consuming the same amount of power. Good thing too because it’s starting at $100 more than its predecessor. Inside of the RTX 4090, NVIDIA has managed to fit 16,384 CUDA Cores clocked at a base speed of 2.23GHz.

Alongside the 4090, NVIDIA will offer two different variants of the RTX 4080. The base model, starting at $899, features 12GB of GDDR6X memory, while the 16GB version will set you back a cool $1,199. Both configurations will arrive sometime in November.