ASUS RTX 3080 Ti TUF Review
Up Close
Packaging is one of those things that always brings a thrill if it’s particularly well-crafted or exciting to open, but otherwise is just something you do your best to get open quickly so you can play with your new toy. The TUF falls very much in to the latter category, although given it’ll spend its life in the bottom of the wardrobe or up in the loft, we’ll happily save a few pence on some fancy box art.
All of the ASUS TUF products have an aesthetic of their own. It’s funny how you can take away much of the fancy lighting or additional features you get from a model higher up in the range, regardless of whether it’s a motherboard or graphics card, and still end up with a product which is instantly recognisable. The triple fan shroud on the RTX 3080 Ti is a perfect match for their TUF motherboard range.
Around the back you get a feel for the simplicity of the build. We like the tyre tread marks emphasising the ‘tough’ nature of the card, but otherwise it’s all the backplate you need and no more.
From the side you can see the TUF logo itself, the one concession to RGB lighting on the card, as well as the twin 8pin PCIe power inputs that let the RTX 3080 Ti stretch its legs.
Should you wish to tame the performance a little bit to give you a little extra silence then you can switch into Quiet Mode. As always we’re testing in Performance Mode, but it’s worth noting that only the most sensitive ears will notice the difference, thanks to the excellent cooling properties of the heatsink and fans on the TUF.
The airflow cutout that exists on all cards shows what a brilliant idea it was. You never saw it at all, one card appeared with it, everyone copied it on everything. We can’t recall the last GPU we saw without it there to help push air towards your CPU cooler.
A closer look at the many heatpipes and fins that make up the TUF cooler. Just because it might not have the aesthetic glitz of higher models in the ASUS range doesn’t mean that they’ve scrimped on the quality.
A good example of this is the IO plate which has the ASUS stainless steel build for extra shininess and corrosion-free longevity. There are three DisplayPort 1.4s and two 8K60 HDMI ports for all your display requirements.
