How come RTX 3080 uses 3x more power than RTX 3080 Ti when idle?

22 Comments

  1. From-UoM

    The power usage are very low to judge and could be just magrin of error or just background stuff

    Look how 3080ti is lower than the 3080 and yet the 3090ti is way above it.

  2. LevelEndBaddie

    One was tested on older drivers and not retested when the new cards and new drivers came out?

  3. Numbers look off. I have a 3090 and it idles around 30w.

  4. Those numbers are straight up wrong.

    I just so happen to have a 3080 in for repair, fixed it yesterday (ever seen a fan chew its own power cable?), and on a 7700K testbench, it self-reports (via GPU-Z and NVAPI) a board power draw of 45.1 watts and a GPU power draw of 22.3 watts.

    This is completely idle, single display, Windows 11 desktop, NVidia driver 546.17 and a Zotac PGF OC RTX 3070 10 GB.

    The 3080 Ti (and some 3070 Tis) use the same GPU, GA102, there’s no possible way a 3080 Ti is idling at 8.8 watts without it being something stupid like a mobile product, which would use the GA103, and has fewer SMs.

  5. Hagstrom_dude

    This screenshot is from an RTX 4090 FE review from 1 October 2022 by Tweakers. I assume older drivers are making an impact here.

    You’ve forgotten to add how this power consumption was actually measured:

    *We perform the current measurement using a so-called riser card from the manufacturer Adex, which we place between the PCIe slot and the graphics card. This allows us to measure not only the current flowing through the individual power cables but also the power drawn directly from the PCIe slot by the graphics card. For the measurement itself, we use various instances of the Tinkerforge Voltage/Current Bricklet 2.0. For the slot measurement, the riser card is equipped with such a bricklet. To measure the current from the PEG cable, the bricklet, along with the necessary connectors, is placed on a print board specially designed for our test. Depending on the number of power cables required by a graphics card, we naturally use various meters.*

  6. 2minuteNOODLES

    My rtx 3080 is using 105w according to HWInfo64. I’d say its accurate.

  7. my 3080 SUPRIM X 10GB seems to idle at 28-32W, is that normal? (balanced windows power plan)

  8. ZX_StarFox

    I have a 3080Ti. Numbers are way off, mine idles at 30w.

  9. K4NT_Skylin3

    I think they used different driver Versions for the measurement

  10. zanethriel

    That’s because 3080 was released before 3080 Ti. When they were engineering 3080 Ti, they decided to change power draw while idling.

  11. HoldMyPitchfork

    I mean it’s clearly a mistake that they didn’t catch. There’s no way a 3080ti idles at sub 10 watts

    The figure for 6950xt is suspicious as well. I dont believe it for a second.

  12. Sudden-Anybody-6677

    Tweakers is an entertaining website to read once in a while, but I have doubts about the level of professionalism in the benchmarks. They often use a questionable setup with sketchy results. People have been pointing it out in the comments for years. I remember for example how they tested Bluetooth speakers, their setup was a random person like the coffee lady behind a curtain who told them which speaker sounded best, LMAO.

  13. TheAtrocityArchive

    Now try Nvidia control panel/manage 3D settings/power management mode = prefer maximum performance.

  14. rmpumper

    I prefer to look at TPU: [https://www.techpowerup.com/review/nvidia-geforce-rtx-4090-founders-edition/39.html](https://www.techpowerup.com/review/nvidia-geforce-rtx-4090-founders-edition/39.html)

    Also, keep in mind that TPU always list reference GPU power draw in their charts as the custom design (especially MSI and Gigabyte tent to do a shit job at TDP) can take up to 2X more on idle and video playback.

    Don’t know about all the GPUs, of course, but my 3060Ti is using 10~11W with reddit open on Firefox.

  15. My 3080 ti is around at 100w +/- 20w. When it’s in idle or simplu running a light video on yt.

  16. Tobias---Funke

    Just out of curiosity, I checked and my 4090FE is idling at 15 watts.

  17. Matty_Sanga

    Random question, but my pc is kinda quite even when under load, but is it normal to hear it kinda buzzing from the gfx card when it’s being used. ( RTX 4080 ) …my 2070 did the same thing at a certain time during game play.

  18. Skull_Reaper101

    my 1050ti idles at 36w…. damn cards can idle lower by a huge margin these days

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