shrug-l: NVIDIA announces release of next generation RTX 3000 series video cards

[Tripp Corbin]

Hello everyone,
Yesterday NVIDIA announced the release of their next generation of RTX
video cards, the 3000 series. NVIDIA is one of the two primary makers of
mainstream video cards. The other being AMD. As GIS folks, you may ask why
is this important to me? That is a great question. So let me answer that.

As we all know GIS is graphics intensive. Our maps, graphs, tables, and
reports display a lot of data in multiple colors, layers, and transparency.
That is just the traditional uses and outputs of GIS. Now we also have
lidar point clouds, multispectral raster, and 3D scenes. All of these are
putting even more strain on our systems to render. New GIS applications
such as ArcGIS Pro are now designed to leverage the capabilities of a
dedicated graphics card to not only render these but to also use the GPU to
assist with some analysis as well. This expanded use of graphics cards will
only continue to increase as more computers include them and the card's
capabilities go up.

So without getting too technical, what benefits can you expect from these
new video/graphics cards from NVIDIA.

   - GPUs build on new Ampere architecture which provides more and enhanced
   tensor cores and more CUDA cores for much better performance (up to 2 times
   the current RTX 2000 series cards)
   - An increased amount of VRAM using GDDR6 and GDDR6X
   - Much faster GDDR6X memory in higher-end models. DDR6X is reported to
   double the data rate per clock over the more traditional GDDR6. This should
   make it much faster when supporting 3D renderings, multispectral imagery
   and AI.
   - Support for HDMI 2.1 which allows for up to 8K graphics
   - Improved thermal solutions to reduce throttling caused by high temps
   and allow for better overclocking
   - Support for PCIe 4.0 which allows for faster and large data transfer
   rates
   - Increase per watt of power performance (reportedly 1.9x the current
   2000 series)
   - Higher frame rates with full-motion video

Unlike previously released NVIDIA cards, the prices for these new 3000
series are much more affordable. Still not cheap but certainly better.
Below are the MSRPs NVIDIA announced

*RTX 3070*
CUDA Cores - 5.888
VRAM - 8GB GDDR6
Price Starting at $499
Release Date - October

*RTX 3080*
CUDA Cores - 8,704
VRAM - 10GB GDDR6X
Price Starting at $699
Release Date - September 17

*RTX 3090*
CUDA Cores - 10,496
VRAM - 24GB GDDR6X
Price Starting at $1,499
Release Date - September 24

For more information about these cards and what they can do you can go to
https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce/news/introducing-rtx-30-series-graphics-cards/
.

The other good news I expect from this announcement is the current RTX 2000
series cards should start going down in price both on the retail and used
markets. These are still powerful cards and will work well for those that
are working with GIS in smaller datasets, not working in 3D, or needing to
process large rasters. I am currently running an NVIDIA RTX 2070 Super and
is works well for 90% of my GIS work. So this might be a good time for you
to upgrade your video card.

I should probably add that to get the most from these new video cards from
NVIDIA, you will most likely need to upgrade your other components such as
motherboard and CPU. Only the X570 and B550 motherboards for AMD processors
and the Z490 motherboards for Intel processors will support PCIe 4.0 for
example. These cards will run in the older PCIe 3.0 slots but the bandwidth
will be limited to half what a PCIe 4.0 can support.

Tripp Corbin, MCP, GISP
Implementation Manager
eGIS Associates (a part of the Davey Resource Group)
tcorbin at egisassociates.com or tripp.corbin at davey.com
eGIS Office:678-710-9710
Davey Resource Group Office: 770-619-5545 Ext 6722
www.egisassociates.com

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