The GTX 980 Ti’s leaked specs reveal it’s a cheaper Titan X

Lying between the GTX 980 and GTX Titan X, the GTX 980 Ti is NVIDIA’s answer to AMD’s forthcoming R9 300 series.

But what exactly does NVIDIA believe it will take to fend off AMD’s latest foray into the GPU market?

A slightly nerfed GTX Titan X is what.

GTX 980 Ti GM200-310 chip

The diagram above is of the GTX 980 Ti’s GM200-310 chip. It’s effectively a GM200-400 with 2 SMMs (or Streaming MultiProcessors Maxwell) disabled, making it a cut down Titan X.

We knew that the GTX 980 Ti would be a more affordable step up from the GTX 980, but we imagined it to be closer in specs to the GTX 980 rather than the Titan X as a result.

Not that we’re complaining. 22 SMMs is a significant increase from the 16 that the GM204-400 sports. We just hope that NVIDIA has learnt from the GTX 970 controversy and will correctly advertise whether the ROPS associated with those 2 SMMs are active or disabled.

Here are the specs as they stand:

Card	Nvidia GeForce GTX 980	Nvidia GeForce GTX 980 Ti	Nvidia GeForce GTX Titan X
GTX 9xx
GPU	GM204-400	GM200-310	GM200-400
Stream processors	2,048	2,816 (37.5% increase)	3,072
TMUs	128	176 (37.5% increase)	192
ROPs	64	TBC	96
Core Clock	1,126MHz	1000MHz	1000MHz
Boost Clock	1,216MHz	TBC	1075MHz
Memory Clock	7GHz GDDR5	7GHz GDDR5	7GHz GDDR5
Memory Bus Width	256 bit	384 bit	384 bit
VRAM	4GB	6GB	12GB
Bandwidth	224 GB/s	336 GB/s	336 GB/s
Max Digital Resolution	4096 x 2160	5120 x 3200	5120 x 3200
Max VGA Resolution	2048 x 1536	2048 x 1536	2048 x 1536
Power Consumption	165W	TBC	250W
Price	R7,800 – R12,000	TBC	R16,000 – R17,800

The differences between the Titan X and GTX 980 Ti are minimal, minus the reduced VRAM.

And the biggest effect the 6GB of VRAM is going to have is a reduced price, as the following benchmark of the GTX 980 Ti, as compared to a benchmarked GTX 980, GTX Titan X, GTX 970, R9 290X, R9 300 “Hawaii XT” and “Hawaii Pro” demonstrates:

NVIDIA-GeForce-GTX-980-Ti-3DMark-Firestrike-Performance

GTX 980 Ti 3D Mark Firestrike Benchmark – Image courtesy of VideoCardz.

As far as we’re concerned, the results speak for themselves.

Granted, synthetic benchmarks like 3DMark aren’t always the best for demonstrating real world performance, but they do a damn good job of making us really want a GTX 980 Ti – it’s one fast card.

AMD’s R9 300 Fiji cards may very well out perform the GTX 980 Ti, as well as the Titan X while we’re at it, but that’s not where the battle is won or lost. Price is what matters.

The GTX 980 Ti should be about the best you can get for a sane price – the Fiji card(s) will undoubtedly be as absurdly priced as the Titan X.

However, we probably shouldn’t forget the R9 300 Hawaii cards. The Hawaii XT and Pro look to be promising competition for the GTX 970 and 980.

GTX 980 Ti Front – Image courtesy of VideoCardz.

Returning back to the star of this show for the moment, NVIDIA’s partners will be granted permission to produce their own versions of the GTX 980 Ti, so don’t expect many to look like this.

With specs approaching the GTX Titan X, it seems prudent to use more capable aftermarket coolers than the stock cooler made available for the GTX 9xx series.

This puppy is going to get hot, but for the performance it garners, it’s definitely worth it.