Nvidia GTX 1070 Performance Review - The new 1440p sweet spot?
Linus Tech Tips
·Linus Tech Tips
·2017-05-06
·
1,562 words · ~7 min read
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The NVIDIA GTX 1070 is sure to be a hit
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card as it follows in the 970s footsteps
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numerically and has an aggressive price point of
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$449 for the Founders Edition and
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$379 for the custom versions that will come later. Steam hardware survey
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beware. Does it have the performance to properly stake a claim to a chunk out of
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the comparatively huge amount of PC consumers wallets?
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Tunnel Bear is the easytouse VPN service that lets you use the web as if you're
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in one of 20 different countries. Learn more and try Tunnel Bear for free at the
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link in the video description. First, let's start with specs. The GTX 1070 is
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the second card in their new Pascal lineup. And it features a GP 104 chip
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with 1920 CUDA cores compared to the 1080s 2560 and runs at a boost clock of
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1683 MHz compared to the 1080 1733 MHz.
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It also features the nice new 16nmter process. Unlike the GTX 1080's shiny new
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GDDDR5X memory, the 1070 is still sporting GDDR5, but is claiming the
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title of the world's fastest version of said memory. As well as running out of
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the box at 8 GB per second, that paired with the new memory compression
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algorithm, which gives you effectively 20% additional bandwidth, results in 8
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gigs of some pretty damn fast GDR5. But
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beyond raw specs, there are some other features NVIDIA has baked into the
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Pascal cookie as well, such as simultaneous multiprojection and anzel,
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which make VR gaming and multimonitor gaming way better and bring gaming
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screenshots into basically the future along with some improvements to NVIDIA
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VR works. But if you want to hear more about those, click here to check them
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out in the official launch review for the GTX 1080. I spend more time on them
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there. We got our hands on the Founders Edition, which sounds fancy, but is
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really just what NVIDIA is calling the reference version and selling for, as
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previously mentioned, $449. A full 70 bucks more than the MSRP
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for base models from add-in board partners whose cards we might be able to
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see at Computex this year, but I expect more of the 1080s to be shown off than
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the 1070s as the launch is so close. The
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seemingly DSX inspired shroud features a similar aesthetic to the silver and
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black shrouds with blower style fans that NVIDIA has been using for the past
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few generations, but with more angles this time around. Connectivity is good
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as it features HDMI 2.0 for 4K at 60 Hz,
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three DisplayPort 1.4 connectors for 4K at 120 Hz or 8K at 60 Hz. Holy crap. And
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dual link DVI. SLI is a little confusing these days because of the introduction
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of new types of multiGPU support with DirectX12. What you need to know for now
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is that classic NVIDIA SLI only supports two-way configurations by default and
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allows users to request something called an enthusiast key directly from NVIDIA,
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which will unlock three-way and four-way SLI even though it is no longer
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recommended by NVIDIA. There is more information to be discussed here like
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in-depth looks at MDA, also known as multi-dis adapter mode, and LDA
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explicit, also known as linked display adapter explicit mode, but we'll cover
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that in a future video exploring the performance differences and general
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support of each mode. So stay tuned for
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that. Also, just a quick note before moving on. If it doesn't seem like we
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have a bunch of AMD cards in our testing, it's because their new Polaris
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architecture, which is supposed to compete with Pascal, is right around the
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corner. We'll have much more from the red team when those cards drop. With
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that said, let's have a look at how our benchmarking turned out. We tested at 4K
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and 1440p. Even if you're watching this and have a 1080p monitor, it's better
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when wielding this much power to run your games at higher resolutions. anyway
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with something called super sampling to make things look super nice. We have a
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guide on that here. Although we've been waiting for the VR games market to
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mature a bit before reviewing how good this thing is with the Rift and the
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Vive, I did want to investigate what resolution exactly this card should
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actually be aimed at for standard desktop gaming. We know from the
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investigation of the 1080 that the 1080 is a rather capable 4K card, as we kind
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of expected. And while the story isn't the same for the 1070, it's impressive
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in its own way. With maxed out settings at every resolution, it destroyed 1080p
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gaming, showing that even with a minor amount of pulling back on the settings,
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you would have a card that can give you the performance you need for your shiny
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new 140 Hz monitor. At 1440p, it kept
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flexing its muscles, never dropping below 60 FPS with all of the settings
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cranked on whatever the highest preset was. Then in 4K, it didn't quite sit up
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with its bigger brother, but still managed higher than 30 FPS and every
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title with its settings cranked even a little bit higher with everything put to
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the max, even above what the highest preset in some games were. Okay, so it's
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mainly a 1440p card if you're going for beauty or a 1080p card if you're going
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for wild frame rate gaming or a 4K card
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if you want to dial back on a fair bit of different settings or don't mind
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gaming at 30 FPS. Although I don't really recommend that if you can avoid
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it. At 1440p, it handily beats its predecessor, the 970. While we did
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expect this after the launch, it's still quite awesome to see a card that isn't
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the flagship perform so well. Speaking of which, what about dollars per frame?
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Well, as expected, the 1070 kind of rocks. The 1080 was already pretty good,
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but it was against really big, beastly,
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expensive setups at 4K. The 1070, when put up against more standard competition
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and something that you'd expect more people to run, still performs quite
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impressively. We still need to wait for AMD's Polaris to really see where it
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lines up, but for now, I'm quite happy. For power draw, the entire bench only
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drew 216 watts from the wall, which is ridiculous and gives you borderline
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unlimited options for lower wattage power supplies. Thermals were even lower
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than expected as well, sitting at 78° C. Just wow. In conclusion, the 1070 really
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looks like the card it needed to be. Sure, the 1080 is great, but its cost
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was also great. The 1070 is able to destroy 1080p gaming, which is still the
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most popular resolution, and gives people fantastic options for high
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refresh rate monitors, and even gives out that sweet, sweet nectar, that is
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1440p gaming at 60 FPS or above. All I
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have to say is to those that delayed upgrading their rigs for the fast past
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like few months, and to my random friend Ryan, it's coming, man. This is very
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possibly the card that you were waiting for. Crunchyroll is a site created by
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anime fans for anime fans. They offer the most current episodes of new shows
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straight from Japan like Twin Star Exorcists and Ace
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Attorney. Large collections of the most popular anime series like One Piece and
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Naruto. I'm going to get ripped on so much for that. And all of the content on
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their site is professionally subtitled. Head over to
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crunchyworld.com/ Linus and you can sign up for a 30-day free trial of
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Crunchyroll Premium. If you enjoy the many benefits of premium, like 1080p
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streaming, getting new episodes of shows straight from Japan within an hour of
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their premiere, which is like almost the whole point, and being able to stream
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anywhere, anytime on a variety of devices like your phone, tablet, game
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console, or, you know, PC, you can continue your premium membership to
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Crunchyroll for only $6.95 per month. So again, head over to
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crunchyroll.com/inus to check them out. All right, guys. Thanks for watching. If
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you liked it, like it. If you disliked it and you're like, I'm waiting for
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Polaris. That's fine. You can do that. Subscribe if you want to see the Polaris
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videos, which will eventually come out. And uh yeah, use our affiliate code to
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shop on Amazon cuz that's super helpful whether you're buying Polaris or Pascal,
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whichever side of the PE coin you decide to go with. Uh check out our shirts in
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the description down below. And don't forget to check out the forum. They're awesome. You can talk about graphics
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cards there. Just don't start a flame war. There's no point in that. Just
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constructive discussion. That's what the form's about. Yeah. Check out this
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video. It's the 1080 review. I mentioned it a few times in this video, but yeah,
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these they're kind of sister videos, so just go check it out.