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The Nvidia RTX 3080 GPU has really been the hot talk on many PC gaming forums around the world. And the reason behind that is its outstanding performance in gaming and GPU crypto mining. Now, there are many other versions of this graphics card like RTX 3080 Founders Edition and RTX 3080 Ti. Both versions of the original RTX 3080 card are a little bit different in specifications, performance, and price. And in this article, we will compare these GPUs and give you our expert recommendation.
Let us talk about RTX 3080 Founders Edition First
| Graphics Processor | Nvidia Ampere GA102 |
| Boost Clock | 1710 MHz |
| Base Clock | 1440 MHz |
| Memory Type | GDDR6 |
| Memory Amount | 10GB |
| Video Outputs | 3 |
| HDMI Outputs | 1 |
| Length | 10.5 inches |
| PSU Requirement | 750W |
| Power Pin Connector | 1x 12-pin |
The Good
- Amazing Performance for the price
- Super silent operation
- Best cooling aethetics
- Ideal for 4K gaming
The Bad
- Lacks DLSS 3.0
- Not enough room to overclock
- Not too much impressive in 1080p and 1440p gaming
The RTX 3080 Founders edition is no doubt the best GPU available right now in the market. It’s one of the top-scorers in the 4K 60fps gaming benchmarks tests as well. We really loved the aesthetics of this GPU, it really has an elegant and performer kind of look to it.
On top of that, the entire body of this graphics card is a cooling rig. And with cooling fans on both sides, this GPU really crowns itself for being the king of the PC gaming world.
Founders Edition is built on Nvidia’s Ampere Architecture, which is an iteration of the famous RTX core system. Compared to the last generation RTX cards like 2080 Super, this card packs double the Cuda core counts and 320-bits GDDR6 ram.
Moreover, for ideal performance in gaming, the RTX 3080 Founders Edition packs RT cores for ray-tracing and a tensor core that handle features like DLSS.
Revolutionary Cooling Design
Well, this is a feature that we really love talking about whenever we review premium-end GPUs. The RTX 3080 Founders Edition comes with dual fans for maximum heat dissipation. Both fans work in tandem with the airflow path of most mid-tower PC cases.
We played some demanding games to test the thermodynamics of this video card. Most of the time, the temps remain stable at 75 Degrees.
12-Pin Power Connector
The Nvidia’s 12-pin power connector puts many questions in your mind. Do you really need a more powerful PSU to run this beast? Now the 12-pin power port supplies the 320W power to run the RTX 3080 Founders Edition. And if your power supply has enough juice to power up this card, you really don’t need to buy a new PSU.
Also, if you don’t have a 12-pin power connector in your PSU, you don’t have to worry about that as well. Right inside the box, you will get a power adaptor to connect your older PSU with this power-hungry GPU. But make sure you have enough power supply, at least 750W or more to run this beast.
Video Output Ports
When it comes to output ports, the Founders Edition comes with 3 DisplayPort 1.4 connections as well as one HDMI output. Now, these outputs have the capability to scale the resolution up to 8K.
Performance
We know that the RTX 3080 Founders Edition is the most powerful graphics card in the market. We run several tests to see if it really falls to the sky-high promises made by Nvidia in its launch. So we test the GPU by exposing it to the most demanding PC games like RDR2, Metro Exodus, Overwatch, and Resident Evil: Village at ultra settings.
Moreover, we also run several benchmarks to see if RTX 3080 really stands out in ray-tracing as compared to its predecessors.
Even when it comes to rendering your videos in Adobe Premiere Pro or Adobe AE, the RTX 3080 overrides the premium-end RTX 3090 in video export scores.
As you can clearly see in the image above, there is a huge jump in the performance of RTX 3080 Founders Edition as compared to the previous models.
We played some games on this 3080 Founders Edition, here are the average frame rates that we got while playing Metro Exodus on this GPU.
As you can see, while playing Metro Exodus, a highly demanding title on PC, the average frame rates were over 120 most of the time with RTX set to high and DLSS turned on. The RTX 3080 Founder Edition shows an impressive performance in 4K gaming, which is confirmed.
We also did some ray-tracing synthetic benchmarks for this GPU, and it didn’t let us lose any hope in that as well. For this test, we used opted for the Boundary and Bright Memory. Now both of these platforms are system crushers even if you have a high-end gaming PC. We set the resolution at 4K, and believe it or not, the average frame rates were above 30+ most of the time.
Now Let’s Tear Down the RTX 3080 Ti
| Graphics Processor | Nvidia Ampere GA102 |
| Boost Clock | 1365 MHz |
| Base Clock | 1655 MHz |
| Memory Type | GDDR6 |
| Memory Amount | 12GB |
| Video Outputs | 3 |
| HDMI Outputs | 1 |
| Length | 11.2 inches |
| PSU Requirement | 750W |
| Power Pin Connector | 1x 12-pin |
The Good
- Performance somehow similar to that of 3090
- The best GPU for 1440p & 4K gaming
- Minimizes the impact of ray-tracing
- Impressive DLSS
- Super silent
The Bad
- Expensive option to go for
- Power hungry GPU
A few months ago, Nvidia was more involved in offering the best mid-range GPUs in the PC gaming market. However, with the launch of the RTX 3080 Ti, Nvidia has crushed the demand for 4K gaming for which many gamers were eagerly waiting. With the shortage of graphics chips around the globe, the prices of many premium-end GPUs also rose up.
Many gamers agree that this is a card that performs nearly the same as RTX 3090. This means that the RTX 3080 Ti packs more power than the Founders Edition. We tested RTX 3080 Ti with many latest PC games, to be honest, the performance was way better than the Founders Edition of RTX 3080. The RTX 3080 Founders Edition that struggles in 1440p, the Ti version fully covers that by all means.
The only thing that keeps someone away from this graphics card, is the higher price. The $1,199 price tag sweeps away the expectations of geeks who are on a tight budget. But as the prices of GPUs are gradually falling down, we hope this graphics card will wobble around the affordable price range as well.
Hardware
Well, if you put both the RTX 3080 Founders Edition & Ti Edition side by side, there isn’t much of a difference. The RTX 3080 Ti also has one fan on either side just like the Founders Edition. The airflow mechanism is the same as the Founder Edition, the air enters from the side that is closer to the CPU and exits from the fan that is facing towards the outside of a PC case.
It also comes with LED strips on the top part of the fan that you can customize as well. This gives an edge to modify the color scheme of your card if you own an RGB gaming PC case.
Cooling
Where the Founders Edition holds the crown for having the best cooling aesthetics, the Ti Edition has a minor problem. Though the fans on this graphics card are super silent, this GPU gets a little hot over time when you play games on it. While games on RTX 3080 Ti, we noticed that the temperature wobbles around 80 degrees Celsius, which is 5 degrees more than that of an RTX 3080 Founders Edition.
Power Connector
Just like the Founders Edition, the RTX 3080 Ti also uses the 12-pin power connector to keep going. And if you don’t have a power connector that much bigger in your current PSU, there is an ugly-looking adapter in the box to do that. Again, the Ti version needs you to have at least 750W PSU in your gaming rig. The reason, the TDP rating of this card is around 320W, and you will need a powerful PSU to feed this beast.
Output Ports
At the back of the card, you will find an x1 HDMI port and x3 1.4a DisplayPorts. An interface similar to that of a Founders Edition RTX 3080.
Performance
Now comes the real part of the show, the performance of RTX 3080 Ti in gaming. For sake of comparison with the RTX Founders Edition, we tested the RTX 3080 Ti with demanding AAA titles like Fortnite, Metro Exodus, and Call of Duty War Zone.
The 1440p Resolution Test
The jump in performance from Founders Edition to Ti Edition is noticeable by looking at the fps table below. We run the same AAA titles on both GPUs with resolution set to 1440p, and here are the results.
| Benchmarks | RTX 3080 Founders Edition | RTX 3080 Ti |
| Fortnite (DLSS on) | 180fps | 177fps |
| Metro Exodus (DLSS+RT) | 65fps | 74fps |
| Call of Duty War Zone (DLSS+RT) | 132fps | 144fps |
As you can see the performance of Founders Edition in Fortnite with DLSS on is better than the RTX 3080 Ti, but in other demanding AAA titles, the RTX 3080 Ti holds more power.
The RTX 3080 Ti delivers excellent performance with DLSS turned on. The DLSS technology allows you to play games at lower resolutions by adopting neural networks and AI supercomputers. And the RTX 3080 Ti really steals the show when it comes to 1440p gaming performance, which the Founders Edition really lacks somehow.
The 4K Testing
For testing the quality of 4K gaming, we used Acer’s 27-inch Nitro XV273K 4K gaming monitor with a refresh rate of 144Hz. While testing the games at 4K resolution, the Metro Exodus showed nearly 13 percent improvement. We tested the same AAA titles on 4K settings that we did on the 1440p test.
| Benchmarks | RTX 3080 Founders Edition | RTX 3080 Ti |
| Fortnite (DLSS on) | 120fps | 133fps |
| Metro Exodus (DLSS+RT) | 48fps | 52fps |
| Call of Duty War Zone (DLSS+RT) | 116fps | 117fps |
All the AAA titles that we tested on the RTX 3080 Ti were easily playable even at 4K settings and average frame rates over 60fps. While in games like Metro Exodus, both the RTX 3080 Founders Edition and the RTX 3080 Ti struggled to climb over 60fps at 4K.
Again the DLSS again here is the key factor when comparing RTX 3080 Founders Edition with the RTX 3080 Ti. The DLSS also sets apart the Nvidia flagship GPUs from AMD chips that are still dependant on GPU scaling to take care of gaming at different resolutions. Even the AMD’s premium end GPU, the AMD’s RX 6800 XT is no match to an RTX 3080 when DLSS is turned on at 4K resolution.
RTX 3080 Founders Edition VS RTX 3080 Ti, Which One is For You
As you have seen in our tests, the RTX 3080 Ti packs more power as compared to the Founders Edition. It allows you to push games at 4K settings and over 60fps. Also, the DLSS performance of RTX 3080 Ti is much better than the RTX 3080 Founders Edition.
The only downsides that we have noticed with this card are the higher price and heating issues over time. But this isn’t something that will affect the performance of this GPU at all. It is one of the best GPUs for editing your videos at 4K or even 8K resolution.
The RTX Founders Edition on the other costs a few bucks less than that of the RTX 3080 Ti. But its performance is still way better than previous flagship GPUs from Nvidia like the RTX 2080 Ti Super.
It still is a good choice if you are looking for a card capable of playing games at 4K. If you really don’t care about the DLSS performance, you can head straight away for an RTX 3080 Founders Edition.
Our Test Machine Used for Analyzing the Performance
Here’s the system that we’ve used to test the performance of both GPUs, the RTX 3080 Founders Edition & RTX 3080 Ti
- Core i9 9900K (Factory Clock Speed)
- ASUS Z390 Motherboard
- Corsair 32GB DDR4 Ram Clocked at 3200MHz
- Cooler Master AIO Cooler
- 1TB Samsung EVO NVMe SSD
- Corsair HX1000W
Hi, I’m the author and founder of this blog. I have more than 10 years of experience in the industry. Throughout my journey I’ve tested and reviewed hundreds of graphics card for custom PC builds. I believe my knowledge and experience will help you choose the card that really falls to your needs and budget.
