GPU - Turbo Boost

[Vector Sigma]

Hello,

I wish to understand how this Turbo boost works. The Turbo Boost on many of the 3rd party versions of the 3090 GPUs are quite beefy.

If you're playing a demanding game in 4k with Ultra Settings and RTX on high enabled, is the turbo boost speed sustainable providing your cooling is sufficient or is it similar to CPU boost where it's only for quick bursts, then defaults back to stock speed?

An example comes to mind is the CPU 10900 can Turbo Boost to 5.3Ghz, but that will only be for a limited period unless your CPU is overclocked on all cores.

In short, I'm trying to work if it's worth buying the Foundation version or the 3rd party editions where higher overclocks, but are they genuine overclocks?

I'll be opting for a customer water rig for both CPU and GPU.

Thank you and pardon my technical ignorance.

 

[Joxeon]

It's similar to a modern CPU as in it boosts according to the specific game/temp/power limit and resolution.

It won't hold steady at an exact frequency as its usual limited by either power or temp and how demanding a particular scene in the game is to render, you can lock it at a set frequency in afterburner though providing you set the right voltage and clock speed so your not hitting the power limit.

 

[Vector Sigma]

It's similar to a modern CPU as in it boosts according to the specific game/temp/power limit and resolution.

It won't hold steady at an exact frequency as its usual limited by either power or temp and how demanding a particular scene in the game is to render, you can lock it at a set frequency in afterburner though providing you set the right voltage and clock speed so your not hitting the power limit.

Thank you for the explanation.

So, it'll require some experimenting to see how far or fast it can be pushed.

 

[TT158]

As above, it really depends on the workload, and the power limit is the main limit with the 30 series cards. In some games my 3090 will stay at 2100 MHz plus using nearly 400W, in others it will be around 1950 MHz using the same amount of power.

If you're trying to choose between Founders and 3rd party cards, the only key difference is the power limit, with some allowing you up to 500W. Even though it's a 20 percent increase over the Founder's Edition, you won't be getting much more than a few percent better performance, and that's only likely under water cooling.

 

[Vector Sigma]

As above, it really depends on the workload, and the power limit is the main limit with the 30 series cards. In some games my 3090 will stay at 2100 MHz plus using nearly 400W, in others it will be around 1950 MHz using the same amount of power.

If you're trying to choose between Founders and 3rd party cards, the only key difference is the power limit, with some allowing you up to 500W. Even though it's a 20 percent increase over the Founder's Edition, you won't be getting much more than a few percent better performance, and that's only likely under water cooling.

Hello,

Thank you for sharing.

In your case, does the GPU speed vary between 2100 Mhz and 1950 Mhz because you haven't set/locked a frequency in Afterburner? Will it stay locked if your card is GPU chilled and feeding it enough power?

 

[TT158]

Hello,

Thank you for sharing.

In your case, does the GPU speed vary between 2100 Mhz and 1950 Mhz because you haven't set/locked a frequency in Afterburner? Will it stay locked if your card is GPU chilled and feeding it enough power?

So I am using a fairly simple overclock now, +170 on the stock curve. The card is on a waterblock and with 3x360 rads, it stays around 42 degrees with ambient temp around 20 degrees. So cool enough that the card isn't down clocking much at all due to temps.

At one stage I had it set to 0.95v and, I think, 2,000 MHz. For Call of Duty Black Ops that would stay at a single frequency pretty much 100 percent of the time, using 300W or so (I don't recall the exact figures, but point being it was well below the 400W power limit, so the card happily holds the voltage and clock speed specified in Afterburner). For Borderlands 3 though, it would often have to reduce voltage below 0.95v, sometimes as low as 0.89v due to it hitting the 400W power limit, and clock speed would reduce as well.

So basically I can set a lock in Afterburner at a voltage needed to make that stable, but it will still clock down if it hits the power limit.

 

[Blue160]

There's not a lot of point worrying about turbo boost. The GPU will clock itself as high as it can automatically as long as it's within it's power, temparature and voltage limits. I don't see any point in locking it.

3rd party boards do clock higher than the FE editions as they have a bios that allows a higher power limit. For an example the FE 3070 will go to 109% power whereas my Palit Gaming Pro goes to 113%. The GPU does boost higher with the exra power draw allowed.

 

[Drumroll]

There's not a lot of point worrying about turbo boost. The GPU will clock itself as high as it can automatically as long as it's within it's power, temparature and voltage limits. I don't see any point in locking it.

3rd party boards do clock higher than the FE editions as they have a bios that allows a higher power limit. For an example the FE 3070 will go to 109% power whereas my Palit Gaming Pro goes to 113%. The GPU does boost higher with the exra power draw allowed.

This.
As someone who have been using AMD for ages, and stayed many years with the HD7970, as wasn't really playing anything new at the time, the only thing I was surprised was that the card would clock higher than the advertised boost.
Comparing to CPU, my 3900 (no fine tuning, just offset voltage -0.1, PBO on), single core would be 4660ish. Multi would be 4300ish.
I was sceptical about the Palit one, as was the only one available and priced closer to RRP, but seems to be a pretty decent GPU.