ASUS RTX 4080 ROG Strix Review

Conclusion

Whenever you get a GPU as capable as the 4000 series from Nvidia it is tempting to think that clock speed no longer matters. After all, if you compare the RTX 3080 Ti to the RTX 4080 on paper then the Ampere card has bigger numbers. The Ada Lovelace architecture on the 4000 series though is such a quantum leap forwards that any ‘core number’ considerations are secondary. When you combine the architectural supremacy of the 4000 series with its significant clock speed improvement there comes a point when one might consider that any extra boost is such a smaller percentage of the overall clock speed that the law of diminishing returns applies. Another 100 MHz on a 400 Mhz card is a massive increase, but on a 2600 MHz card, it’s surely not going to show up that much in the graphs?

However, as we’ve seen throughout this review, and indeed we also saw with the ASUS ROG Strix RTX 4090, there is still a place in the world for a card which just runs balls to the wall all the time. The Strix RTX 4080 is 90 MHz fast than the next best at stock. The peak speed is less than this gain, with the Strix 60 MHz ahead of the next best. However, it is in the world of average clock speed where the gains are to be found. We thought the 2760 MHz the Nvidia Founders Edition obtained was impressive, and the 2800 MHz of the Gigabyte Aero was even better, the ASUS Strix achieves 2881 MHz average. This shows up time and again in our testing where the Strix wasn’t just a tiny bit better, occasionally swapping places with other cards. Nope. It was to be found at the upper end of our graph and basically stayed there.

In fact the only time it wasn’t really at the top end of our graph was the temperature testing. The newly designed Strix cooler was incredible on the RTX 4090 and, being exactly the same size and design but cooling much less architecture, on the RTX 4080 it was the kind of cooler most people dream of. A peak of 54°C and a delta of a shocking 32°C is insanity.

Even knowing that there is always a heavy price to pay for getting one of the Strix range of ASUS ROG graphics cards, we think the performance increases and frosty temperatures are worth that extra investment. The ASUS RTX 4080 ROG Strix is a beast and wins our OC3D Enthusiast Award*.

* Just before going to press we’ve heard rumours that the ASUS Strix RTX 4080 is going to be extremely close to the RTX 4090 FE in price terms. If that’s remotely true there is zero reason at all to get this card instead of a base model RTX 4090. Of course if this is only £100 more than the Founders Edition RTX 4080 then the opinion that the Strix is the card to get remains true. But if it’s actually retailing near £400 more than the RTX 4080 FE it’s very very expensive but also leads us wondering why this one is so much cheaper in comparison to the Strix 4090 mark up?.
We haven’t confirmation of this yet, and we have to have written this before anything is official, but in the interests of transparency and clarity we’ve added this paragraph.

  

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