Nvidia could launch its RTX 3060 Ti in late October
Nvidia could be launching its GeForce RTX 2060 Ti in late October as the next GPU in its Ampere range after the launch of the RTX 3070 in a couple of weeks.
The rumor comes from Videocardz, which cites two separate sources claiming that the RTX 3060 Ti is coming—though, as with all rumors, this should be taken with a grain of salt.
What’s interesting about the rumors is that it’s stating that Nvidia is unleashing the RTX 3060 Ti before the vanilla RTX 3060. This isn’t usually the case, traditionally, the vanilla spec of a card releases first before its more powerful Ti, or “Titanium” version.
Possible production issues
Based on the rumors, one possible reason for the Ti version of the RTX 3060 hitting first could be down to production issues.
The RTX 3060 Ti will supposedly be using a downgraded version of the GPU found in the upcoming RTX 3070, the GA104. This version will have 4,854 CUDA cores—1,024 less than the 5,888 on the RTX 3070. In addition, while the RTX 3060 is said to have the same 8GB of GDDR6 video RAM, it’ll be slower at only 14Gbps compared to 16GBps for the RTX 3070.
The “vanilla” RTX 3060, on the other hand, will supposedly use a different GPU, the GA106. This chip, however, is supposedly not yet ready for production, forcing Nvidia to push the Ti version out the door first.
Response to Big Navi
As for why Nvidia would want to push a mid-range card out the door soon could have to do with the impending October 28 launch of AMD’s upcoming, RDNA2-based, Big Navi cards.
While AMD itself has not revealed any specific details about Big Navi, rumors have surfaced pointing to the new cards as Team Red’s biggest generational leap so far. Leaked details on TechPowerUp’s GPU Database indicate that the top-end Big Navi cards, such as the RX 6900 XT could give even Nvidia’s high-end RTX 3080 a run for its money.
The RX 6900 XT will supposedly come with 16GB of GDDR6 video memory, with a 256-bit interface and it’s set to run from 1,350MHz to 2,000MHz. It also sports 5,120 stream processors, which translates into 80 compute units 9CUs. The RTX 3080, on the other hand, has 10GB of GDDR6X with a 320-bit interface and a boost clock of 1,710MHz.
While the RTX 3080 could compensate for having a lower clock speed and less memory with the use of faster memory and a bigger memory interface bus, on paper, the RX 6900 XT looks to give Nvidia’s card a run for its money.
If the numbers are true, then AMD could pose an even bigger threat in the mid-range of the market—an area where AMD has made great strides. As such, the speculation is that Nvidia is rushing the mid-range RTX 3060 Ti to spoil AMD’s party by trying to beat out the latter’s mid-range Big Navi offerings.
If this Nvidia’s plan, then the comparison between the RTX 3060 Ti and the supposed entry-level Big Navi card—the RX 6500 XT—seems to mirror that of their bigger brothers. The RX 6500 XT will supposedly have 10 GB of GDDR6, more than the RTX 3060 Ti.
Of course, all these are just speculations based on rumors and supposed leaks. The question of whether or not things will pan out this way, with Nvidia releasing a souped-up mid-range card in to head off AMD will be answered at the end of this month.
