Graphics cards, even in the past couple of generations, have come an incredibly long way. The jump from the Maxwell to Pascal cards were so incredibly great, that the previous value of cards like the acclaimed GTX 970 were suddenly sinkholed. There had never been such a massive jump in power and performance before, especially considering how damn good the 9-series cards were. If you wanted a Titan-level card, the 980ti was going to last you for years and years (and it still will).
And yet. They come out with the 1070, 1080, and (slightly later on) 1080ti, and everything goes into technological pandemonium.
The 1070 was as good, if not slightly better than the previous generation’s Titan X, which was considered absurdly powerful by most people’s standards. The 1080ti was on a whole ‘nother level completely, vehemently shattering any sort of idea we had about how good graphics cards could, should, and would be. All of a sudden, 1440p/144hz gaming was no longer a pipedream that was getting closer. It was here, and now. 4k gaming wasn’t under the “not quite ready yet” category. We were ready (With the help of Gsync). This couldn’t have come at a better time either. Gamers started to smarten up and realize that they didn’t need every single knob turned up to max in their games, software, and overclocks. Prices were getting lower, and PC gaming was starting to see more support across the board.
Now, the Pascal cards have a firm grip on the market, with reasonable value choices in the 1050ti and 1060, an amazing midrange option in the 1070, and the 1080ti being the top of the mountain.
So . . . why the hell do we need a 1070ti?
Essentially, the “ti” part of Nvidia GPUs are basically an indicator that they’re better than the same numbered card. If the 1070ti is slated to be better than the 1070, then that means it should line up with the 1080. If that’s the case, why not just get a 1080? Well, price could be a factor, as a 1080 goes for about $550, depending on model.
Now, for the big words you probably don’t understand. The 1070ti comes with 2,432 cuda cores, which is lower than the 1080’s 2560. The core clock of the stock model is exactly the same, at 1,607MHz, but the boost clock is a bit lower; 1683MHz to the 1080’s 1,733MHz. The memory speed and memory bandwidth is also lower, checking in at 8GHz to 10GHz, and 256GB/s to 320GB/s, respectively. Lastly, the RAM size is the same as all models lower than the 1080, GDDR5, which is to be expected.
To put it in gamer terms, the 1070ti is not that much worse than the 1080 by any stretch, but it’s meaningfully more noticeable of an improvement over the 1070, especially when overclocking is involved. Price wise, you can grab a 1070 for about 400 bucks, but a 1070ti runs almost exactly in the middle, price wise, of the 1070 and the 1080.
So this begs the question; is it worth saving up the extra 50-70 bucks for a 1070ti? Well, I think that’s looking at it the wrong way. The better question is if it’s worth saving another 70 bucks to go from a 1070ti to a 1080. In terms of cost efficiency, the 1070ti is definitely the best buy out of the three, especially if you’re moving up to 1440p/60hz or 144hz. It’s a perfect niche for those subset of gamers looking to get the most out of their Acer Predators or ROG Swifts. The 1080 has never really been a value purchase unless you’re planning on going SLI, but it feels even less-so now, as the 1070ti would save you a lot of money while giving comparable performance when overclocked.
What was initially perceived as an unnecessary addition to the Pascal family has become a pretty solid investment for those working their way up to the higher tiers of performance for their PC. It does a better job at pushing out the 1080 than it does making the 1070 obsolete, which is a good thing for people on a budget.
Anthony has been competing in games for the better part of his adult life and is dedicated to improving his game, improving his community, improving himself as a person, and most importantly having fun and enjoying himself while doing so. You can check out his stream to find out which video game is the latest to catch his attention.