Conclusions

The GeForce GTX 1070 Ti is a pretty impressive card. If you were looking for MORE options for high-end graphics cards and didn’t think the $399/$499 GTX 1070 and GTX 1080 were enough, NVIDIA and its partners have you covered now. At $450, the GTX 1070 Ti will make an already crowded market segment even more crowded. But for NVIDIA, any GeForce sale is better than a Radeon sale. And for consumers that might already be targeting this budget, picking up a 1070/1070 Ti/1080 card will likely fall within $50 ranges, depending on sales, availability, rebates, OC models, etc.

Our benchmark data shows that in a handful of cases, the performance delta between the GTX 1070 Ti and the GTX 1080 is surprisingly small. Dirt Rally, Fallout 4, and even Hitman show both cards to be within spitting distance of each other. Even at its extreme, our testing shows the GTX 1080 to only be about 10% faster than the GTX 1070 Ti. Comparing the new card to the older GTX 1070, the Ti model has performance advantages ranging from 10-25%, with a typical result being in the 15-18% range. As predicted on the first page of this review, the performance of the GTX 1070 Ti leans much closer to that of the GTX 1080 than the GTX 1070.

Comparing the GeForce GTX 1070 Ti to the RX Vega lineup, the story is positive in NVIDIA's favor as well. The Vega 56, which undercut the GeForce GTX 1070 by a good margin at initial release, gets overrun by the latest NVIDIA offering. Tomb Raider shows the only performance parity result while other titles like GTA V, Fallout 4, and Hitman give the edge to the GTX 1070 Ti by as much as 20%+. That also means the GTX 1070 Ti puts up a good fight with the RX Vega 64.

For AMD, the release of this card complicates and already complicated storyline. The Vega 64 and Vega 56 have had a difficult start, with availability shortages caused by production and cryptocurrency. Both AMD and NVIDIA sent out emails today about Vega pricing and availability. For its part, AMD reiterated the Vega 56 and its ability to shine in newer gaming titles as well as the sale prices of $399 and $419 at Microcenter.

NVIDIA is quick to point out that pricing the Vega 56/64 has suddenly dropped in the last 24 hours and claims that these are going to be short lived. Looking at services like Nowinstock.net and Camelcamelcamel.com, they show pricing consistently at $469 and higher for the Vega 56 prior to yesterday. The theory is that AMD is doing this simply to lower prices for the reviewer and media consideration as we write GTX 1070 Ti stories, to be more in favor of AMD’s product lineup. To be transparent, AMD made the EXACT SAME CLAIM on the GTX 1070 during the launch window of the Vega 56 and Vega 64 cards. My, how quickly life circles around.

GeForce GTX 1070 Ti cards have been up for pre-order for a week already. Availability over the long term, and if the crypto miners will buy all of this initial stock up immediately, will be judged over time.

From my point of view, the GeForce GTX 1070 Ti is a great card from NVIDIA to pinch AMD in the high-end market. AMD had been absent from this segment for a long time, and NVIDIA was maybe getting a bit too fat and happy – a little competition has the effect to get people up and moving. With the stock performance of the GTX 1070 Ti nearing that of the GTX 1080 in some instances, and the overclocking headroom to easily add another 5-10% on top of that, if you can find a custom cooled option at a reasonable price, jump on the chance.

Giving out awards for graphics card releases is a tough call these days, but offering up a GPU that is $50 less than GTX 1080, with very similar performance, even if its sole purpose is to keep a competitor's option from looking appealing, is a win for gamers.

 

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