Question Buy a RTX 3090 when it's back in stock at MSRP or wait for RTX 4080?

Dave3000

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Jan 10, 2011
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I currently have a Ryzen 5800x and a GTX 1080 Ti but I want to upgrade to a RTX 3090, specifically the Founder's Edition, when it's back in stock at MSRP or should I wait for the RTX 4080, assuming that I want one priced no higher than MSRP and I don't have to wait several months or a few years for one to be in stock without camping out. I plan on buying a 4k monitor as well.
 

Aapje

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Mar 21, 2022
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If you are American, you can get the 3090 FE from BestBuy at MSRP right now. Nvidia no longer seems to be selling it in their store.

No one can tell you for sure whether waiting is better. There is a decent chance of a major mining downturn before then and the next AMD gen seems to be very competitive, which is generally good news for consumers as both sides need to up their game. The 4080 is also likely to be first card to be released by Nvidia, in 6 months or so. However, supply is almost certainly going to be below demand, as is almost always the case for any new cards.

BTW, why are you not considering the 3080 Ti, which is the same tier as your 1080 Ti, or the 3080?
 
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blckgrffn

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Yeah, I don’t know when the 3090 will ever really hit “MSRP” again while it’s at its current Nvidia hierarchy - pretty sure they’ll sunset it as the 3080Ti “Fe” appears to be $1200.

It looks like 12 GB 3080s are consistently under $1K, I’d do that and be done again for a long time. The 4080 is probably going to get sold out like mad again, and the 1080ti will just be worth that much less by then.

Plus… why expect the 4080 to retail under $1500? If it’s handily faster than the 3090 it seems like it’ll be right there. MSRP/Founders Editions are likely to be unicorns. Plenty of demand for new, unlined cards from a legion of gamers who skipped this Gen.

That’s my $.02. The memory heating problems on 3090 non-ti would keep me away for now.
 
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Shmee

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I personally would wait for the next gen cards at this point, but if you have to buy now, I would go with a 3080 12GB or a 6900XT.
 
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Dave3000

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Jan 10, 2011
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If you are American, you can get the 3090 FE from BestBuy at MSRP right now. Nvidia no longer seems to be selling it in their store.

No one can tell you for sure whether waiting is better. There is a decent chance of a major mining downturn before then and the next AMD gen seems to be very competitive, which is generally good news for consumers as both sides need to up their game. The 4080 is also likely to be first card to be released by Nvidia, in 6 months or so. However, supply is almost certainly going to be below demand, as is almost always the case for any new cards.

BTW, why are you not considering the 3080 Ti, which is the same tier as your 1080 Ti?

I was considering it until I found out the the HD texture pack for Far Cry 6 will require more than 11GB VRAM.
 

ZGR

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Oct 26, 2012
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I guess you gotta ask yourself how many games need more than 11GB of VRAM that you want to play ASAP. If you have a backlog of games you wanna play now at 4k144, you might be content with just a 3060 ti until RTX 4000 is out. But the 3080 ti has 12GB and that should be plenty for FC6 with the ultra hd texture pack.
 

Muadib

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Yeah, I don’t know when the 3090 will ever really hit “MSRP” again while it’s at its current Nvidia hierarchy - pretty sure they’ll sunset it as the 3080Ti “Fe” appears to be $1200.

It looks like 12 GB 3080s are consistently under $1K, I’d do that and be done again for a long time. The 4080 is probably going to get sold out like mad again, and the 1080ti will just be worth that much less by then.

Plus… why expect the 4080 to retail under $1500? If it’s handily faster than the 3090 it seems like it’ll be right there. MSRP/Founders Editions are likely to be unicorns. Plenty of demand for new, unlined cards from a legion of gamers who skipped this Gen.

That’s my $.02. The memory heating problems on 3090 non-ti would keep me away for now.
The memory heating problem is a non issue, unless you plan on mining. Mining was the only time I saw it with my 3090 FE, and it was easily fixed by underclocking. Some added pads on the card to fix the issue, but I thought that was silly. I played New World and Cyberpunk, and never had an issue.
 
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moonbogg

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If 4080 releases in 6 months you might not get one for at least 9 months or a year. They will be vaporware and gone in an instant, no matter how many they release. You can probably get one on ebay for 2-3x msrp though. The only way they stay in stock is if msrp is $2000+.
 

blckgrffn

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The memory heating problem is a non issue, unless you plan on mining. Mining was the only time I saw it with my 3090 FE, and it was easily fixed by underclocking. Some added pads on the card to fix the issue, but I thought that was silly. I played New World and Cyberpunk, and never had an issue.

That’s fair, but given how close the 3090 in the wild is to the 3090Ti price wise I am still take the Uber card without compromise, no matter if it’s a semi niche issue.

Otherwise get a 12 GB 3080 and camp out for a bit.

Honestly now is a nice time compared to a year ago. At least once you commit to opening your wallet, you can just buy what you want.
 
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Muadib

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That’s fair, but given how close the 3090 in the wild is to the 3090Ti price wise I am still take the Uber card without compromise, no matter if it’s a semi niche issue.

Otherwise get a 12 GB 3080 and camp out for a bit.

Honestly now is a nice time compared to a year ago. At least once you commit to opening your wallet, you can just buy what you want.

I agree with you on the 3090Ti. I was tempted to sell my 3090 and get the 3090Ti, but decided to wait for the 4000 series.
 
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moonbogg

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I heard the 4090 will have what's called a reactive msrp. When you're about to click add to cart, the price increases by 10% until your mouse cursor is no longer over the button. At that point, the price drops by 5% until you're willing to click again then the price holds.
 

Frenetic Pony

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May 1, 2012
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If you just want something now a 3090 is fine, it's not like it's going to be outdated anytime soon even with new cards dropping soonish.

If you want "the most performance possible" for your money then I'd wait. It doesn't look like the crypto zombie is in any shape to rise from the grave and the new cards should give better price/performance; at the very least by dropping the price of the older cards.
 

Dave3000

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I guess you gotta ask yourself how many games need more than 11GB of VRAM that you want to play ASAP. If you have a backlog of games you wanna play now at 4k144, you might be content with just a 3060 ti until RTX 4000 is out. But the 3080 ti has 12GB and that should be plenty for FC6 with the ultra hd texture pack.

I also believe that I'm maxing out my video card's VRAM in X-Plane 11 when using the Felis 747-200 and the SSG 747-8, HD Mesh, Traffic Global, and Airport Environment HD at 1080p with texture quality set to max in the game because when I lower the texture quality to High, the 1 second stutters go away while taxing at LAX. Also it only happens if I use these two aircraft. At the max texture quality setting, textures are using nearly 10GB of VRAM and that's at 1080p. Stock X-Plane 11 with stock aircraft, textures don't use nearly that much VRAM, even at the max texture quality setting. A 3060 Ti would not be enough of an upgrade from a 1080 Ti, and I think I can wait for a 4080 at this point since the Best Buy website is still show Sold Out for the 3090 Founder's Edition. I don't want to go less that 16GB VRAM. I also plan on getting a 4k HDR monitor at some point, I just can't find one that I like the design of right now.
 
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ZGR

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I also believe that I'm maxing out my video card's VRAM in X-Plane 11 when using the Felis 747-200 and the SSG 747-8, HD Mesh, Traffic Global, and Airport Environment HD at 1080p with texture quality set to max in the game because when I lower the texture quality to High, the 1 second stutters go away while taxing at LAX. Also it only happens if I use these two aircraft. At the max texture quality setting, textures are using nearly 10GB of VRAM and that's at 1080p. Stock X-Plane 11 with stock aircraft, textures don't use nearly that much VRAM, even at the max texture quality setting. A 3060 Ti would not be enough of an upgrade from a 1080 Ti, and I think I can wait for a 4080 at this point since the Best Buy website is still show Sold Out for the 3090 Founder's Edition. I don't want to go less that 16GB VRAM.

Don't forget the RX 6900/6950 XT with its 16GB of VRAM :D

I do agree that 3060 Ti (or 3060 12GB) would be struggling. Only reason I recommend it is you get immediate access to HDMI 2.1; which would let you get a decent 4k144 monitor ASAP. If you are gonna go 3090, I would only look at the 3090 Ti. 1080 Ti is still OK at 4k60 low/medium settings, but since it cannot do HDMI 2.1, it won't be worth getting a new monitor until then.

If you end up waiting for RTX 4000, we should (hopefully) see DisplayPort 2.0 support to let you choose a lot more 4k144 models down the road. This is what I'm waiting for. I like idea of not having to be limited to HDMI monitors for 4k144 with HDR.
 
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Shmee

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Yeah, sounds like the 6900XT or 6950XT would be around what you would want if you were not going to wait, unless you were going to pay extra for a good 3090 or 3090 Ti. Now these are certainly options, but I would avoid the FE, they generally aren't as fast. Is there any reason you would want an FE, other than possibly lower price?
 
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