Nvidia was reportedly expected to unveil its GeForce RTX 3080 12GB graphics card at CES 2022, but due to an apparent decision to delay the announcement at the 11th hour, it’s now set to be officially revealed tomorrow instead.
According to Wccftech’s sources, the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 12GB variant will be introduced at 6 a.m. PT on January 11. Although there’s no indication on the price of the GPU, the sources mention that it would either be available to pre-order starting tomorrow or that it will be sold immediately.
This isn’t the first delay for the upgraded GPU. Previously, the RTX 3080 12GB was said to be scheduled for a December 17 unveiling, which was apparently postponed due to the current shortage of components. However, a rumor highlighted how Nvidia had already distributed the card to board partners.
As for what improvements the GPU offers over the standard 10GB model, the RTX 3080 12GB is said to be based on the Ampere GA102-220 GPU, which is geared toward the high-end gaming market. It’s also the fastest gaming GPU that Nvidia has manufactured thus far.
The 12GB of memory, meanwhile, will be based on the next-generation GDDR6X standard. As a result, Wccftech notes that the new RTX 3080 will be capable of delivering GDDR6X memory speeds of 19Gb per second. The GPU will also see its TDP increase from 320 watts to 350 watts.
The upgraded RTX 3080 12GB will apparently sport 8960 CUDA cores, representing nearly 3% more cores (256 to be exact) than the original. The graphics card will also feature next-generation ray tracing cores, tensor cores, and a wider 384-bit memory bus interface that will supply 912 GB/s of bandwidth (the original provides 760 GB/s of bandwidth).
Graphics cards are in scarce supply due to the current shortage affecting the technology industry, so the RTX 3080 12GB will be an enticing option, especially for enthusiasts. Crypto miners will also be interested in acquiring the GPU. The Lite Hash Rate (LHR) for the upgraded video card is apparently 20% faster at 52 MH/s — the original featured a LHR of 43 MH/s.
Other Nvidia graphics cards that were actually revealed during CES 2022 were the flagship RTX 3090 Ti GPU and the budget $250 RTX 3050. The latter is due for a January 27 release.
