The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 780 Ti Review
by Ryan Smith on November 7, 2013 9:01 AM ESTMeet The GeForce GTX 780 Ti
When it comes to the physical design and functionality of the GTX 780 Ti, to no surprise NVIDIA is sticking with what works. The design of the GTX Titan and its associated cooler have proven themselves twice over now between the GTX Titan and the GTX 780, so with only the slightest of changes this is what NVIDIA is going with for GTX 780 Ti, too. Consequently there’s very little new material to cover here, but we’ll quickly hit the high points before recapping the general design of what has now become the GTX 780 series.
The biggest change here is that GTX 780 Ti is the first NVIDIA launch product to feature the new B1 revision of their GK110 GPU. B1 has already been shipping for a couple of months now, so GTX 780 Ti isn’t the first card to get this new GPU. However while GTX Titan and GTX 780 products currently contain a mix of the old and new revisions as NVIDIA completes the change-over, GTX 780 Ti will be B1 (and only B1) right out the door.
As for what’s new for B1, NVIDIA is telling us that it’s a fairly tame revision of GK110. NVIDIA hasn’t made any significant changes to the GPU, rather they’ve merely gone in and fixed some errata that were in the earlier revision of GK110, and in the meantime tightened up the design and leakage just a bit to nudge power usage down, the latter of which is helpful for countering the greater power draw from lighting up the 15th and final SMX. Otherwise B1 doesn’t have any feature changes nor significant changes in its power characteristics relative to the previous revision, so it should be a fairly small footnote compared to GTX 780.
The other notable change coming with GTX 780 Ti is that NVIDIA has slightly adjusted the default temperature throttle point, increasing it from 80C to 83C. The difference in cooling efficiency itself will be trivial, but since NVIDIA is using the exact same fan curve on the GTX 780 Ti as they did the GTX 780, the higher temperature throttle effectively increases the card’s equilibrium point, and therefore the average fan speed under load. Or put another way, but letting it get a bit warmer the GTX 780 Ti will ramp up its fan a bit more and throttle a bit less, which should help offset the card’s increased power consumption while also keeping thermal throttling minimized.
| GeForce GTX 780 Series Temperature Targets | ||||
| GTX 780 Ti Temp Target | GTX 780 Temp Target | GTX Titan Temp Target | ||
| 83C | 80C | 80C | ||
Moving on, since the design of the GTX 780 Ti is a near carbon copy of GTX 780, we’re essentially looking at GTX 780 with better specs and new trimmings. NVIDIA’s very effective (and still quite unique) metallic GTX Titan cooler is back, this time featuring black lettering and a black tinted window. As such GTX 780 Ti remains a 10.5” long card composed of a cast aluminum housing, a nickel-tipped heatsink, an aluminum baseplate, and a vapor chamber providing heat transfer between the GPU and the heatsink. The end result is the GTX 780 Ti is a quiet card despite the fact that it’s a 250W blower design, while still maintaining the solid feel and eye-catching design that NVIDIA has opted for with this generation of cards.
Drilling down, the PCB is also a re-use from GTX 780. It’s the same GK110 GPU mounted on the same PCB with the same 6+2 phase power design. This being despite the fact that GTX 780 Ti features faster 7GHz memory, indicating that NVIDIA was able to hit their higher memory speed targets without making any obvious changes to the PCB or memory trace layouts. Meanwhile the reuse of the power delivery subsystem is a reflection of the fact that GTX 780 Ti has the same 250W TDP limit as GTX 780 and GTX Titan, though unlike those two cards GTX 780 Ti will have the least headroom to spare and will come the closest to hitting it, due to the general uptick in power requirements from having 15 active SMXes. Finally, using the same PCB also means that GTX 780 has the same 6pin + 8pin power requirement and the same display I/O configuration of 2x DL-DVI, 1x HDMI, 1x DisplayPort 1.2.
On a final note, for custom cards NVIDIA won’t be allowing custom cards right off the bat – everything today will be a reference card – but with NVIDIA’s partners having already put together their custom GK110 designs for GTX 780, custom designs for GTX 780 Ti will come very quickly. Consequently, expect most (if not all of them) to be variants of their existing custom GTX 780 designs.
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Owls - Thursday, November 7, 2013 - link
Ryan I'm sorry but the video card reviews as of late have been very poor in quality and objectivity. Stop rushing to be the first. I don't go to Anand to read a crappy review, that's what HardOCP is for.That said your testing is flawed with old games and comparing the Ti to be faster than a 290x that is in silent mode is disingenuous. We all expect better from this site.
nsiboro - Friday, November 8, 2013 - link
True - unfortunate wordings. But we gotta learn to read between the lines e.g. 780ti cannot be compared to 290/X. :)nunomoreira10 - Thursday, November 7, 2013 - link
totallywhy does he even compare the non "uber" 290x to the 780TI
its very misleading when he says it´s 11% faster then 290x not pointing out the fact that it was in silent mode.
also not sure which drivers were used on the 290x
hoboville - Thursday, November 7, 2013 - link
Sigh, I've always had good experiences with Nvidia products. They have always been good to me, but the pricing nonsense of GK110 has really put me off, a lot. I get it, you have the best so you charge people for the best, but all this does is put performance hardware further out of reach of people.Most people can't afford even $300 GPUs. A fact Maximum PC editors have commented on many times when they talk about how most people have relatively "low-end" hardware in their systems. AMD, because they haven't had the performance crown has clearly been going for performance-per-dollar. And that's good, very good for you. Because let's face it, money is a real determining factor for almost everyone.
And to think, if I did have $700 to spend, I'd spend $100 more and just get 2 R9 290s. 150% performance for 15% more money, not bad...
Trenzik - Thursday, November 7, 2013 - link
Very, very true comment. Money determines EVERYTHING. You know what makes something worth buying, price. I agree I prefer Nvidia due to past experience with AMD, BUT Nvidia is expensiveeeeee. Were talking a 4GB video card for 500 bucks.DominionSeraph - Thursday, November 7, 2013 - link
"Bloody" price war?The GK104 was designed to be the successor to the GF114, i.e. the $250 GTX 560 Ti. But as it turned out faster than AMD's high end chips it became the $500 GTX 680 and, 14 months later, the $400 GTX 770. The GK110 should've been the replacement for the GTX 580 at $500, but it became the $1000 Titan and $650 GTX 780. We are now 20 months past the release of the GK104 and all AMD's $550 launch price did was push Nvidia's midrange chip to $330.
The GTX 460 was hailed as the value king at launch at $200. Six months later you could get one for $90 as we saw a real price war between AMD and Nvidia.
20 months now and the GK104 is still going for $330, with Nvidia's back-pocket here being released at $700? There's no war here.
Skiddywinks - Thursday, November 7, 2013 - link
Yeh, I have to agree with your argument here. This is no "bloody" price war by any stretch.I can't fault companies for trying to make better margins, but there has not been a well priced GPU in years. Well priced compared to competition, sure, but I remember the days when £200 would typically get you the top end single GPU card. Hell, the HD 4870X2 cost me £330 only a month or two after launch. Now what does that get me? Probably an after market cooled 290. Not even the X.
TheJian - Thursday, November 7, 2013 - link
You guys are forgetting how much R&D these cost, how much money they make now compared to when chips were small and had higher yields (simpler) etc. These chips are HUGE and complicated to make. See my "simple economics" post. They haven't more than 2007 in the last 6yrs. Which should immediately explain why the price is high. They are not making as much even though they sell more than 2007.The 4870 was 256mm, not 550mm+. That card came with 956mil transistors vs. 7.1B here on a single chip (even 2x 4870's was smaller and 5B+ less transistors etc). It came with 512MB as 4870 (2GB on the 4870x2 I think) vs. 3GB of much faster stuff. 4870x2 launched at $550 and your price is $530us. That same $530 today almost gets you a 290x and it smokes your 4870x2 right? How is that bad?? You act like R&D is free (not just the chips either, software R&D too).
http://www.techpowerup.com/68231/amd-launches-rade...
I think it was samsung that said on dailytech the other day that it costs 20x more to make a chip today in R&D than 1995. Considering profits, it's amazing they sell this stuff at current pricing and actually quite stupid, they're doing you a favor on both sides - or they'd be making more money right? For instance, AMD 48mil first time profitable in 5 quarters, losing 6Billion+ in the last 10yrs. Umm, somebody is pricing crap wrong when you lose 6Billion in 10yrs. :)
There is no other way to say that ;) YOU NEED TO CHARGE MORE. Period. This low pricing has caused them to double their outstanding shares (meaning SERIOUS share dilution), sell their fabs, lose 6B, sell their land, lose the CPU war completely, have all kinds of driver issues (even Variance now with new 290x/290) etc etc...The list of crap low pricing has caused is HUGE. Did I mention the value of the company today (1/4 it's worth in just the last few years)? I digress...
DominionSeraph - Thursday, November 7, 2013 - link
You don't know what a GK104 is, do you?just4U - Friday, November 8, 2013 - link
Jian, They are not doing us any favors... Their in the business of making money (well mostly.. amd loses year over year but not due to their graphics department..) and looking for ways to entice you into parting with your coin.