ASUS TUF Gaming GeForce RTX 3090 OC Edition Review

1. Introduction
2. Everything You Need to Know About Ampere
3. ASUS marketing
4. Detailed Look
5. Test System Specs
6. Benchmarks - Synthetic
7. Benchmarks - 1080p
8. Benchmarks - 1440p
9. Benchmarks - 4K
10. Overclocking
11. Power Consumption & Temps
12. What's Hot, What's Not
13. Final Thoughts

TweakTown's Rating: 99%

The Bottom Line

ASUS offers some of the best performance money can buy with the TUF Gaming GeForce RTX 3090 OC Edition. The thermal performance on this card is stellar, as is the TUF Gaming aesthetics. Nice work, ASUS!

Buy at Amazon

Introduction

ASUS has a few top of the line custom GeForce RTX 3090 graphics cards, with its own ROG STRIX GeForce RTX 3090 but there's also the TUF Gaming GeForce RTX 3090 which has its own look and style -- but that same Ampere GPU + 24GB of GDDR6X memory underneath.

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Today we're looking at the ASUS TUF Gaming GeForce RTX 3090 OC Edition graphics card, which packs a triple-fan cooler, a factory overclocked GPU and just dual 8-pin PCIe power connectors required. The card runs quiet, has powerhouse GeForce RTX 3090 performance, and is ready to handle virtually any game or task you can throw at it.

ASUS said the TUF Gaming GeForce RTX 3090 "stripped down and built back up to provide more robust power and cooling". The company is using an all-metal shroud that has a triple-fan cooler keeping everything operating nice and chill. The fan rotation has been tweaked by ASUS to reduce turbulence, with a stop mode for all 3 fans that will see them stop spinning when the GPU isn't loaded.

There's a new fan shroud here on the ASUS TUF Gaming GeForce RTX 3090 OC Edition which looks great in-person, and it doesn't stand out too much. If you want the GeForce RTX 3090 power without a huge amount of RGB bling then you've got what you're looking for with the ASUS TUF Gaming GeForce RTX 3090 OC Edition.

When it comes to price we're looking at the card starting at $1900 on Newegg at the time of writing, but availability is unknown right now and that's the case for most of the world.

• NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 Founders Edition review
• NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Founders Edition review

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Just look at the sheer CUDA core count increase, from the 4608 CUDA cores inside of the TITAN RTX to the insane 10496 CUDA cores inside of the RTX 3090. We have increases across the board, with third-gen Tensor Cores (328 of them) versus second-gen Tensor Cores in the TITAN RTX (576 of them).

We have 82 second-gen RT Cores in the new RTX 3090, versus 72 first-gen RT Cores inside of the TITAN RTX while TUs get bumped up from 288 to 328 and ROPs from 96 to 112 -- nice increases across the board, with some even more impressive performance numbers.

We have the same 24GB of VRAM here -- but the new RTX 3090 gets some ultra-fast GDDR6X memory versus the slower GDDR6 (but same 24GB framebuffer) on the TITAN RTX. It's on the same 384-bit memory bus, but the new GDDR6X is clocked at a much higher 9750MHz (19.5Gbps) versus 7000MHz (14Gbps) which results in way higher memory bandwidth numbers that hit 936GB/sec on the RTX 3090 compared to just 672GB/sec.

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NVIDIA has a new third-generation NVLink bridge and connector with the GeForce RTX 3090, with the new RTX 3090 the only one in the Ampere-based GeForce RTX 30 series stack that supports multi-GPU technology. The new third-gen NVLink bridge has 112.5GB/sec of bandwidth to share between two RTX 3090 graphics cards.

ASUS TUF Gaming NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 OC Edition

	Today	Yesterday	7 days ago	30 days ago
	$879.99	$879.99	$934.47	$1599.95	Buy
* Prices last scanned on 4/24/2024 at 8:48 pm CDT - prices may not be accurate, click links above for the latest price. We may earn an affiliate commission.

Everything You Need to Know About Ampere

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• Ampere GPU architecture: NVIDIA has so much going on under the Ampere GPU hood, with the GA102 GPU packing a huge 28 billion transistors (that's 28,000,000,000) on the Samsung 8nm node. We have a huge 10496 CUDA cores on GA102, over double the 4608 CUDA cores on the TITAN RTX.
• RTX improvements: NVIDIA has effectively doubled everything when it comes to RTX, where it will rips and tears your games and delivers them to your eyeballs faster than ever before with Ampere. If you want to run any RTX-powered games, you'll want a new GeForce RTX 3080.
• GDDR6X memory: The new NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 has 10GB of GDDR6X memory on a 320-bit memory bus, with a huge 760GB/sec of memory bandwidth. You should see the 4K gaming results for the evidence of the Ampere GPU + GDDR6X memory slaying it.

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• PCIe 4.0 connectivity: NVIDIA's new GeForce RTX 30 series graphics cards are now PCIe 4.0 compatible, so if you're building a new AMD Ryzen 3000 series system with an X570 motherboard -- you will be ready to rock and roll with PCIe 4.0 connectivity.
• HDMI 2.1: 4K 120Hz + 8K 60Hz = single cable: If you are buying a new TV in the coming months or years, HDMI 2.1 is going to be something you want. It opens up the bandwidth floodgates to 4K 120Hz and 8K 60Hz over the single HDMI 2.1 cable.
• RTX IO: NVIDIA's introduction of RTX IO with Ampere is very similar to the ultra-fast game load times on the next-gen Xbox Series X and PlayStation 5 consoles. You can read all about RTX IO right here, which is something we'll see build more foundation in 2021 and beyond.

ASUS marketing

You can read all about the card on the official ASUS TUF Gaming GeForce RTX 3090 OC Edition website.

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Detailed Look

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ASUS goes for a mean but not overly RGB-blinged style with the TUF Gaming GeForce RTX 3090 graphics card, and I'm a fan of it. NVIDIA's own GeForce RTX 3090 Founders Edition is a huge 3-slot beast that is gigantic, while ASUS has a pretty light and smaller RTX 3090 with the TUF Gaming card.

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I don't know what it is about back plates, but man I am such a fan -- and ASUS has such great aesthetics on the back of the TUF Gaming RTX 3090. It's hard to miss, and still has RGB lighting to add to the experience but it isn't overpowering to take away from the graphics card either.

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The card is definitely thinner than NVIDIA's much thicker and larger GeForce RTX 3090 Founders Edition graphics card.

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You only need dual 8-pin PCIe power connectors.

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ASUS gives you an additional HDMI 2.1 port with the TUF Gaming GeForce RTX 3090, which can come in handy depending on your setup.

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There's also dual BIOSes on the card.

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Test System Specs

Latest upgrade:

Sabrent sent over their huge Rocket Q 8TB NVMe PCIe M.2 2280 SSD, which will be my new Games install SSD inside of my main test bed.

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I've got a new upgrade inside of my GPU test bed before my change to a next-gen test bed, where I will be preparing for NVIDIA's next-gen Ampere graphics cards and AMD's next-gen RDNA 2 graphics cards.

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Sabrent helped out with some new storage for my GPU test beds, sending over a slew of crazy-fast Rocket NVMe PCIe M.2 2280 SSDs. I've got this installed into my GPU test bed as the new Games Storage drive, since games are so damn big now. Thanks to Sabrent, I've got 2TB of super-fast M.2 PCIe 3.0 x4 SSD storage now.

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Anthony's GPU Test System Specifications

I've recently upgraded my GPU test bed -- at least for now, until AMD's new Ryzen 9 5950X processor is unleashed then the final update for 2020 will happen and we'll be all good for RDNA 2 and future Ampere GPU releases. You can read my article here: TweakTown GPU Test Bed Upgrade for 2021, But Then Zen 3 Was Announced.

• CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 3800X (buy from Amazon)
• Motherboard: ASUS ROG X570 Crosshair VIII HERO (buy from Amazon)
• Cooler: CoolerMaster MasterLiquid ML360R RGB (buy from Amazon)
• RAM: G.SKILL Trident Z NEO RGB 32GB (4x8GB) (F4-3600C18Q-32GTZN) (buy from Amazon)
• SSD: Sabrent 2TB Rocket NVMe PCIe 4.0 M.2 2280 (buy from Amazon)
• PSU: be quiet! Dark Power Pro 11 1200W (buy from Amazon)
• Case: InWin X-Frame 2.0
• OS: Microsoft Windows 10 Professional x64 (buy from Amazon)

Benchmarks - Synthetic

3DMark Fire Strike

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3DMark has been a staple benchmark for years now, all the way back to when The Matrix was released and Futuremark had bullet time inspired benchmarks. 3DMark is the perfect tool to see if your system - most important, your CPU and GPU - is performing as it should. You can search results for your GPU, to see if it falls in line with other systems based on similar hardware.

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3DMark TimeSpy

Heaven - 1080p

Heaven is an intensive GPU benchmark that really pushes your silicon to its limits. It's another favorite of ours as it has some great scaling for multi-GPU testing, and it's great for getting your GPU to 100% for power and noise testing.

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Benchmarks - 1080p

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Assassin's Creed: Valhalla is the latest game to be inserted into our benchmark suite, with Ubisoft Montreal using its AnvilNext engine to power the game. It scales really well across the cards, and has some surprising performance benefits with AMD's new Big Navi GPUs.

You can buy Assassins Creed: Valhalla at Amazon.

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Middle-earth: Shadow of War is a sequel to the popular Shadow of Mordor, which was powered by the Lithtech engine. When cranked up to maximum detail, it will chew through your GPU and its VRAM like it's nothing.

You can buy Middle-earth: Shadow of War at Amazon.

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Metro Exodus is one of the hardest tests that our graphics cards have to go through, with 4A Games' latest creation being one of the best looking games on the market. It is a serious test that pushes GPUs to their limits, and also features RTX technologies like DLSS.

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Shadow of the Tomb Raider is one of the latest games to join our graphics card benchmark lineup, with the game built using the Foundation engine as a base, the same engine in Rise of the Tomb Raider. Eidos Montreal R&D department made lots of changes to the engine during the development of Shadow of the Tomb Raider to make it one of the best-looking games out right now.

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1080p Benchmark Performance Thoughts

Don't buy this card for 1080p gaming.

However, it does hold its own but loses in some cases to AMD's new flagship Radeon RX 6900 XT. You can rest assured that the ASUS TUF Gaming RTX 3090 will also kick ass at 1080p gaming, it's just that it's not the resolution and use case for this card unless you wanted 240/280/360FPS for those super-insane gaming monitors.

Benchmarks - 1440p

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Assassin's Creed: Valhalla is the latest game to be inserted into our benchmark suite, with Ubisoft Montreal using its AnvilNext engine to power the game. It scales really well across the cards, and has some surprising performance benefits with AMD's new Big Navi GPUs.

You can buy Assassins Creed: Valhalla at Amazon.

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Middle-earth: Shadow of War is a sequel to the popular Shadow of Mordor, which was powered by the Lithtech engine. When cranked up to maximum detail, it will chew through your GPU and its VRAM like it's nothing.

You can buy Middle-earth: Shadow of War at Amazon.

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Metro Exodus is one of the hardest tests that our graphics cards have to go through, with 4A Games' latest creation being one of the best looking games on the market. It is a serious test that pushes GPUs to their limits, and also features RTX technologies like DLSS.

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Shadow of the Tomb Raider is one of the latest games to join our graphics card benchmark lineup, with the game built using the Foundation engine as a base, the same engine in Rise of the Tomb Raider. Eidos Montreal R&D department made lots of changes to the engine during the development of Shadow of the Tomb Raider to make it one of the best-looking games out right now.

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1440p Benchmark Performance Thoughts

This is where things start to swing around, where in Assassin's Creed: Valhalla the card gets its ass handed to it -- but so does everything except for AMD's new Radeon RX 6800 XT and Radeon RX 6900 XT graphics cards. But in Shadow of War and Metro Exodus, the ASUS TUF Gaming RTX 3090 tops the charts.

Benchmarks - 4K

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Assassin's Creed: Valhalla is the latest game to be inserted into our benchmark suite, with Ubisoft Montreal using its AnvilNext engine to power the game. It scales really well across the cards, and has some surprising performance benefits with AMD's new Big Navi GPUs.

You can buy Assassins Creed: Valhalla at Amazon.

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Middle-earth: Shadow of War is a sequel to the popular Shadow of Mordor, which was powered by the Lithtech engine. When cranked up to maximum detail, it will chew through your GPU and its VRAM like it's nothing.

You can buy Middle-earth: Shadow of War at Amazon.

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Metro Exodus is one of the hardest tests that our graphics cards have to go through, with 4A Games' latest creation being one of the best looking games on the market. It is a serious test that pushes GPUs to their limits, and also features RTX technologies like DLSS.

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Shadow of the Tomb Raider is one of the latest games to join our graphics card benchmark lineup, with the game built using the Foundation engine as a base, the same engine in Rise of the Tomb Raider. Eidos Montreal R&D department made lots of changes to the engine during the development of Shadow of the Tomb Raider to make it one of the best-looking games out right now.

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4K Benchmark Performance Thoughts

4K gaming is where it's at on the ASUS TUF Gaming RTX 3090, where it offers some commanding performance in Shadow of War with an insane 120FPS average -- beating out the RTX 3090 FE by 3FPS. The card hits 65FPS average in Metro Exodus up against 63FPS from the RTX 3090 FE.

We see Shadow of the Tomb Raider performance on the ASUS TUF Gaming RTX 3090 doing well, with 118FPS average that beats out the RTX 3090 FE by 6FPS with its 112FPS.

If you want some of the very best 4K gaming performance, especially for games like Cyberpunk 2077, then the ASUS TUF Gaming RTX 3090 OC Edition is a damn good choice.

Overclocking

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Out of the box the ASUS TUF Gaming GeForce RTX 3090 OC Edition was sitting at around 1815MHz boost GPU clock with temps at around 64C and the fans spinning at 71% (1760RPM). Damn good results here for out of the box, but what about overclocked?

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My sample was able to hit just under 2000MHz with the card most stable at just on 1980MHz -- with the fans at 100% the GPU temps drop to 56-57C. Impressive stuff here, but you can tweak the fan profile yourself and not keep the card running this loud as the cooling on the TUF Gaming RTX 3090 kicks so much ass.

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Power Consumption & Temps

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Out of the box the ASUS TUF Gaming GeForce RTX 3090 OC Edition was running at 64C, while when the card was manually overclocked and had its fans pushed to 100% then the GPU was running much cooler... down to 56C. This is a great difference compared to the GeForce RTX 3090 Founders Edition which runs at up to 67C at stock.

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Now, let's talk about the power consumption -- at stock the ASUS TUF Gaming RTX 3090 used around 480W in our AMD Ryzen 7 3800X system while when the card was overclocked the entire power consumption jumped by 50W up to 530W total.

What's Hot, What's Not

What's Hot

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• TUF Gaming style and build: ASUS has really changed the game with its TUF Gaming family, offering similar build quality to the flagship ROG branding but at a cheaper level. Not only that, but the design style of the TUF Gaming RTX 3090 is great too.
• Dual BIOS: ASUS includes dual BIOSes with the TUF Gaming GeForce RTX 3090
• Insane 4K performance: NVIDIA provides some out of this world performance with the GeForce RTX 3090 as it is, but ASUS provides some more here with some nice OC headroom.
• Amazing thermal performance: 64C out of the box with grunty RTX 3090 performance, or 56C when it's overclocked and the fans are at 100%. Whatever way you look at it, ASUS has some great thermals here with the TUF Gaming RTX 3090 OC Edition graphics card.

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• Mind blowing 8K gaming performance: You might not have an 8K monitor or TV but for whatever PC gamers are out there in the world with the money to slap down on 8K, then the RTX 3090 is going to give you that performance. Nothing else comes close, and when you add in DLSS magic you're hitting 60FPS easily.
• 24GB of GDDR6X: NVIDIA ships the GeForce RTX 3080 with 10GB of VRAM, we are to expect 20GB models in the near future, but the RTX 3090 ships with a huge 24GB of GDDR6X. This helps it have superior 4K and much more superior 8K gaming performance.

What's Not

• No stock: This is an issue, but it doesn't take away from the card -- this isn't the fault of ASUS and it doesn't go against the TUF Gaming RTX 3090 but it's about the only thing I can find 'wrong' with the card.

Final Thoughts

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If you are in the market for a new flagship GeForce RTX 3090 graphics card, then the ASUS TUF Gaming GeForce RTX 3090 OC Edition should be right up your alley. If you can find one when you're ready to purchase and see this review, know that you are safe in the TUF hands of ASUS.

The ASUS TUF Gaming GeForce RTX 3090 OC Edition runs nice and cool, as well as nice and quiet -- and as I said throughout the review it doesn't blow your eye sockets out with too much RGB lighting. ASUS provides a dual BIOS on the card with Performance and Quiet modes, which will come in handy for some gamers and overclockers.

ASUS deserves praise for turning the TUF Gaming RTX 3090 into a powerhouse with its own style, that branches out and away from the ROG brand. The TUF Gaming RTX 3090 looks mean, performs like a monster and can be whisper quiet like a ninja and running cool like, well, something cool.

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If you can, or once you eventually find the ASUS TUF Gaming RTX 3090 OC Edition in stock, don't hesitate -- it'll carve through everything you throw at it... Cyberpunk 2077 included.