Unnamed sources in the Taiwanese graphics card manufacturing chain are claiming that Nvidia will officially launch its GeForce GTX 1080 Ti graphics card between March 20 and March 23. That window may seem rather odd given that the Game Developers Conference will be held in San Francisco from February 27 to March 3 followed by Nvidia’s own GPU Technology Conference in San Jose from May 8 to May 11.
However, it is most likely that the GTX 1080 Ti will be unveiled at Nvidia’s “GeForce GTX Gaming Celebration” event during the Game Developers Conference later this month. This event will take place in downtown San Francisco on February 28 starting at 6:30 p.m. PT. After that, third-party manufacturers are expected to release their versions alongside a Founder’s Edition model in late March, or shortly thereafter.
So far, the pricing of the GTX 1080 TI is unknown, but the base price will likely be around $900 given the GTX 1080 has a base price of $600 and the meatier Titan X runs at a hefty $1,200. Here’s what we know about the GTX 1080 Ti so far:
| GTX 1080 | GTX 1080 Ti | Titan X | |
| GPU: | GP104-400 | GP102 | GP102 |
| Process node: | 16nm FinFet | 16nm FinFet | 16nm FinFet |
| CUDA cores | 2,560 | 3,328 | 3,584 |
| Base speed: | 1,607MHz | 1,503MHz | 1,417MHz |
| Boost speed: | 1,733MHz | 1,623MHz | 1,531MHz |
| Performance: | 8.87 TFLOPS | 10.8 TFLOPS | 11 TFLOPS |
| Memory: | 8GB GDDR5X | 10GB GDDR5X | 12GB GDDR5X |
| Memory speed: | 10,000MHz | 10,000MHz | 10,000MHz |
| Memory bus: | 256-bit | 320-bit? | 384-bit |
| Memory bandwidth: | 320GB/s | 480GB/s | 480GB/s |
| TDP: | 180 watts | 250 watts | 250 watts |
| Price: | $600 | $900? | $1,200 |
As the specs show, the GTX 1080 Ti will seemingly be a scaled down version of the Titan X, relying on the same graphics chip but with fewer cores. The GTX 1080 Ti will also have the Titan X’s memory bus, bandwidth, and maximum power draw. However, the on-board GDDR5X memory will max out at 10GB, sitting rather nicely between the GTX 1080’s 8GB and the Titan X’s 12GB.
News of the GTX 1080 Ti’s retail release window arrives after the unannounced card was spotted on the physical edition of Halo Wars 2. As shown on the box, Nvidia’s GTX 1080 TI will be required if PC gamers want to run the game on the Ultra settings. Note that the box doesn’t mention any unannounced AMD “Vega” cards:
| Minimum | Recommended (1080p @ 60Hz) |
Ultra | |
| Operating system: | Windows 10 64-bit | Windows 10 64-bit | Windows 10 64-bit |
| Processor: | Intel Core i5-2500 AMD FX-4350 |
Intel Core i5-4690K AMD FX-8350 |
Intel Core i7-6700K AMD FX-9590 |
| Graphics: | Nvidia GeForce GTX 660 AMD Radeon HD 7750 Intel HD Graphics 4000 |
Nvidia GeForce GTX 1060 AMD Radeon RX 480 |
Nvidia GeForce GTX 1080 Ti AMD R9 Fury X |
| Memory: | 6GB | 8GB | 16GB |
| Video memory: | 2GB | 4GB | 8GB |
Just before Nvidia reveals its GTX 1080 Ti card on February 28, AMD will hold its own “Capsaicin & Cream” developer event on the same day starting at 10:00 a.m. PT According to AMD, the show will highlight “the hottest new graphics and VR technologies propelling the games industry forward.” That seemingly suggests AMD will finally reveal graphics cards based on its next-generation Vega graphics chip architecture. These cards will compete with Nvidia’s Geforce GTX 10 Series products, including the new GTX 1080 Ti.
