The RTX range of graphics cards from Nvidia are considered the most powerful consumer GPU’s in the world. The company managed to add new technologies that will provide lighting techniques that many believed were still years away from being possible with Nvidia’s reference cooler design. However, this all comes at a higher price tag.

The latest generation of graphic cards from Nvidia are far more expensive than the previous versions. This is relevant even when you factor in the recent pricing problems that many buyers are facing across the globe. With that in mind, let’s take a look at what these graphics cards actually are, and more importantly, what they can do.

The RTX Graphics Cards

The incredible line-up of RTX graphics cards for desktop PC’s that you can purchase right now is five. This includes the RTX 2060, the RTX 2070, the RTX 2080, the RTX 2080 Ti, along with the Titan RTX. Each of them is available as Founders Editions directly from Nvidia with a reference cooler design and higher clock speeds. They range from $600 to $2,500 and each of the graphics cards, apart from the Titan RTX, come in several guises provided by third-party manufacturers. They include all the aftermarket whistles and bells, including feature support, aesthetic changes, higher and lower overclocks, and alternative coolers. Although these are high-end graphics cards, the company also provides a mid-range card thanks to the RTX 2060 that will go for $350 while providing the same feature set with reduced performance capabilities.

High Performance

After Nvidia decided to stick to ray tracing performance, our testing of these cards proved that they were the most powerful ever developed, but not by much. There’s no denying that they are much better when it comes to ray tracing. However they mostly just increased the performance spectrum by one notch when it comes to general gaming.

The 2080 is obviously far more powerful when compared to the 1080, and the same can be said for the 2080 Ti compared to the 1080 Ti. However, the 2080 fell behind the popular 1080 Ti in several tests, especially when it came to our 4K gaming test. The new cards are between 20% to 30% faster than the older versions. However, in several tests, it’s far less, so the overall improvements to performance will greatly depend on the software being used.

DLSS and Ray Tracing

Even though the number of CUDA cores have increased with the new graphics cards across the board, the most incredible achievement to the new cards is the addition of hardware for AI and ray tracing. What’s even more impressive is the DLSS technology in the RTX cards that manage to produce higher resolution without dampening the overall performance. Although it’s not perfect when the range of games that are currently available, it’s still something to get excited about for future gaming. These graphics cards are going to take the world by storm, but you will need to fork out quite a bit to experience them.