NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 'prototype' teased, features triple-fan cooler

A prototype version of NVIDIA's upcoming AD102-based GeForce RTX 4090 has been leaked, with a triple-fan cooler teased that won't be used in the final design.

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The new NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 prototype was leaked by "Greymon55" but we don't know which AIB partner has made this, although it looks very similar to many different triple-fan coolers on high-end graphics cards that are already on the market. It looks very similar to triple-fan ASUS and MSI graphics card designs, but is also giving me some triple-fan Vega GPU-cooling Radeon VII vibes.

NVIDIA's new GeForce RTX 4090 graphics card has 16384 CUDA cores, 24GB of ultra-fast GDDR6X memory and up to 450W of power according to the latest rumors. We're expecting 600W to be unleashed, but that could be for a beefed-up GeForce RTX 4090 or higher-end GeForce RTX 4090 Ti that will see Ada Lovelace chewing down another 150W+ of power.

• Read more: ASUS ROG Strix LC GeForce RTX 3090 Ti OC Edition Review
• Read more: MSI GeForce RTX 3090 Ti SUPRIM X Review

We could be looking at an early prototype of a 600W cooler, where we have been hearing for many months now that the higher-end Ada Lovelace GPUs will be using up to 600W of power. The new 16-pin power connector will allow the next-gen GPUs to be driving up to 600W.

If this prototype cooler is anything to go by, cooling 600W of power would've been planned earlier this year in preparation for later this year when NVIDIA unloads Ada Lovelace in whatever form they do. NVIDIA would have to be working with AIB partners to prepare their cooling designs to handle 600W, as we know they already do with the beefed-up GeForce RTX 3090 Ti design using thermal setups that can handle 450W+ of power being driven through them.

We are seeing PSU manufacturers announce and release next-gen power supply after next-gen power supply, especially in the higher-end 1000W+ and 1200W+ models. You'll need a new PSU if you're going to be seeing "power excursions" of 1000W+ on these new graphics cards, or much, much higher than that if we have dual-GPU setups in professional setups. Maybe not for gamers, but content creators and professionals would definitely want to bet on getting a new, high-end, quality PSU with a 600W+ graphics card or two.