PC gamers who are looking to improve the quality and speed of their systems' graphics and embrace the newest display technologies on the market, but don't want to have to spend $600 or more to do it, now have another option. Nvidia today released the second in its flagship line of video cards using the new Pascal microarchitecture: the GeForce GTX 1070.
This card follows closely on the heels of the GTX 1080, which Nvidia officially unveiled (with the GTX 1070) earlier this month but just went on sale late last week. Both cards use a version of the GP104 Pascal GPU, which is based on 16nm FinFET transistors that can stack vertically to allow more to be packed in a smaller space without requiring more power.
The differences include that the GTX 1070 implements fewer Graphics Processing Clusters (three versus four), Streaming Multiprocessors (15 versus 20), CUDA processing cores (1,920 versus 2,560), and Texture Units (120 versus 160); runs at a slower base clock speed (1,506MHz versus 1,607MHz); and, though it packs the same amount of memory (8GB), it uses slower GDDR5 rather than GDDR5X for a total memory bandwidth of 256GBps rather than 320GBps. There is also a difference in the Thermal Design Power (TDP) between the two cards: Whereas the GTX 1080 requires 180 watts of power, the GTX 1070 needs only 150 watts.
Nvidia claims the GTX 1070 runs faster than a Titan X, the top-end card of the GeForce 900 series that was released in March 2015, and is currently available for sale online for prices upward of $1,100.
Specific speeds and specs aside, the GTX 1070 includes all the same features of the GTX 1080, including the Ansel engine for taking improved in-game screenshots; Simultaneous Multi-Projection, for improved multimonitor and VR gaming; and Fast Sync, a new method of monitor syncing that lets the user reduce screen tearing even when on-screen animation is being displayed at extremely high frame rates. It also shares the earlier card's new limitations to Nvidia's Scalable Link Interface (SLI) system, which emphasizes use of only two- rather than three- or four-card configurations. And like the GTX 1080, the GTX 1070 is a full-length (10.5-inch) video card requiring two expansion slots.
Nvidia GeForce GTX 1070 cards will go on sale to the public on Friday, June 10. Two versions of the card will be available: the $449 Founders' Edition, essentially the Nvidia "reference" design that will be available first, and other versions with custom card and cooler designs from third-party manufacturers that will retail at $379.
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