Nvidia Ampere: RTX 3000 graphics cards rumoured to launch in September

Leaks and rumours for the upcoming Nvidia Ampere graphics cards are dropping fast, with the next-gen hardware set for release in the coming months. We’ve seen rumours for specs and performance, and now we’ve potentially got a glimpse of the design. 

Photos have been added to a forum called Chiphell which seem to show off the rumoured RTX 3080 graphics card. We’re not convinced this is the real deal though, with several odd details in the photo including an upside-down logo. There’s still the exciting possibility that these are early production models though.

RTX 3080??https://t.co/arLfHmxT90 pic.twitter.com/JF73FUN9OM

— HXL (@9550pro) June 6, 2020

 

There’s still no official release date for Nvidia Ampere, but a report from DigitTimes claims it could launch in September. The report does not provide a source, but we still reckon it could be accurate since it lines up so nicely with previous reports.

We also don’t know much about the specs or features. We at least know the RTX 3000 cards will use the Ampere architecture which features TSMC 7nm node; a noticeable upgrade on the 12nm node found with previous Turing graphics cards.

A lot of speculation has also suggests Nvidia will go big on ray tracing, which makes a lot of sense given PS5, Xbox Series X and AMD Big Navi will all be embracing the technology this year.

Keep reading for more in-depth leaks and rumours for the upcoming Nvidia Ampere graphics cards/

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Nvidia Ampere release date – When will Nvidia launch RTX 3080 and RTX 3070?

Multiple sources are suggesting Nvidia Ampere RTX 3000 graphics cards will launch in September 2020.

Tweaktown claims the Nvidia Ampere graphics cards will be officially revealed in August and then launch in the following month. This would mean Nvidia Ampere will likely have a major presence in the postponed Computex trade show.

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Nvidia Ampere price – How much will RTX 3080 and RTX 3070 cost?

There are very few rumours regarding price so far, which is to be expected since Nvidia likes to set the price at the latest possible time to undercut the competition.

A Wccftech report claims that Nvidia is looking to make the RTX 3080 and RTX 3070 slightly cheaper than their Turing counterparts in a bid to make ray tracing accelerated cards more appealing to a mass market. With the RTX 2080 Ti graphics card currently costing over £1000, that comes as no surprise.

Buy the RTX 2080 Ti from Scan Computers for £1,077.98

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Nvidia Ampere specs

The Nvidia Ampere GPUs are confirmed to use 7nm architecture, which is already an upgrade on the larger 12nm architecture found with the current Turing graphics cards. 

Further specs details are far more uncertain though. Wccftech suggests the Ampere GPUs will see more vRAM, higher clock speeds and improved power efficiency. 

Other sources, including MyDrivers and Twitter account KittyCorgi, have been far more specific with the specs, but aren’t as credible a source. If they are to be believed though, the Nvidia Ampere specs could be as follows (with comparisons):

Nvidia RTX 3080 Ti	Nvidia RTX 2080 Ti
Architecture	Ampere	Turing
CUDA Cores	5376	4352
Memory size	12GB	11GB
Memory Bus	384-bit	352-bit

 

Nvidia RTX 3080	Nvidia RTX 2080
Architecture	Ampere	Turing
CUDA Cores	3840	3072
Memory size	10GB	8GB
Memory Bus	320-bit	256-bit

 

Nvidia RTX 3070	Nvidia RTX 2070
Architecture	Ampere	Turing
CUDA Cores	3072	2304
Memory size	8GB	8GB
Memory Bus	256-bit	256-bit

Recent leaks have suggested the Nvidia Ampere specs are even better than the ones shown above, although we’re not convinced by those reports. The China Times (spotted by Videcardz) has supposedly given us a sneak peek at the specs for some of the new Nvidia Ampere cards, including the RTX 3080 Ti, RTX 3080, RTX 3070 and RTX 3060.

However, these specs are so astonishing that they’re difficult to believe, as they suggest the Nvidia RTX 3080 Ti has 8192 GPU cores, 256 RT cores, 1024 Tensor Cores and a Boost Clock Speed of 1750MHz. These figures are substantially higher than what previous rumours suggested, making the new leaks dubious to say the least.

Related: Intel vs AMD

While we’re not sure about the exact specs, most rumours and leaks are at least correlating with the fact that Nvidia will look to push the ray tracing performance to new heights, which makes a lot of sense given Nvidia’s investment in its RTX range.

Related: Ray tracing explained

Nvidia Ampere performance

Rumours suggest the upcoming RTX 3080 Ti will be 40% more powerful than the current RTX 2080 Ti. Considering the latter is currently the most powerful consumer graphics card by a big margin, this news is incredibly impressive and could potentially see frame rates reach new levels for 4K gaming.

Nvidia is also rumoured to be intensifying its efforts on ray tracing, which makes a lot of sense since both the PS5 and Xbox Series X will support the technology and likely increase the awareness and demand for the realistic light-rendering feature. 

Wccftech reports that, “Ampere’s ray tracing cores will be faster, more power efficient and Ampere GPUs will have more of them as compared to Turing.” 

It remains to be seen whether Ampere will actually improve the ray tracing visuals, or simply enhance the frame rate performance when the technology is activated. But with an increasing number of upcoming games confirming support for ray tracing, Nvidia already has a greater platform for success than it did with its Turing GPUs. 

Nvidia will likely discuss more visual-boosting features made possible via the Ampere architecture, including improved rasterization, but we’ll have to wait until August for official details. 

Nvidia Ampere design

There have been very few rumours and leaks regarding the design of Nvidia Ampere graphics cards, which is no surprise since it’s arguably the least important feature for a GPU and is difficult to leak without photographs. However, new leaks claim to show off Nvidia’s RTX 3060 card.

The supposed leaked images were posted to a Chinise forum Chiphell, showing the RTX 3060 and an unidentified GPU. We’re not convinced these graphics cards are legitimate though, as they don’t feature the same attention-to-detail styling as previous cards, while one also sees the “RTX 3080” in an upside-down position in relation to the PCIe power connector.

It’s very possible these are just early production models, but either way, it’s highly likely that final Nvidia Ampere cards won’t end up looking like this. That said, this is further testament to the building hype surrounding Nvidia Ampere, which is rumoured to launch in a few months. Stick to Trusted Reviews for the latest information.

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