Review – PNY GeForce RTX 4070 12GB XLR8 Gaming VERTO EPIC-X RGB Triple Fan

The embargo for the RTX 4070 OC model from the board partners has finally lifted and this time, we’ll be taking a look at the PNY GeForce RTX 4070 12GB XLR8 Gaming VERTO EPIC-X RGB Triple Fan and see how it fairs against the RTX 4070 Founders Edition. In case you’re wondering why the lengthy name, it’s decided by PNY but to make things easier from here on, we’ll just call it the RTX 4070 VERTO EPIC-X in this review.

To better gauge its performance, we have also compared it against the RTX 3080 OC and RTX 4070 Ti, apart from the Founders Edition model which we consider as the baseline for our performance test.

Specifications

Unboxing

The RTX 4070 VERTO EPIC-X ships in a rather compact box this time but you’re not losing anything from the smaller packaging. Inside the box, you’ll find just the RTX 4070 VERTO EPIC-X and a quick installation guide for the product.

There are no other extra accessories this time because the RTX 4070 VERTO EPIC-X is the model that uses a PCIe 8-pin connector instead of the 12VHPWR connector that is commonly seen on the RTX 40 series graphics cards to date.

Design-wise, the RTX 4070 Verto Epic-X looks like a shrunken version of the RTX 4070 Ti Verto Epic-X RGB at first glance. The smaller dimension of the RTX 4070 Verto Epic-X is definitely good news for the small form factor build enthusiasts, as it can now fit into smaller cases much easier but is still able to offer reasonable performance for most users nowadays.

As we’ve mentioned earlier, the RTX 4070 Verto Epic-X is one of the RTX 4070 that comes with a PCIe 8-pin connector instead of the 12VHPWR connector that we’ve seen on all of the previously announced RTX 40 series graphics cards. This is made possible thanks to the lower-rated TDP at 200W, which can be supplied from both the PCIe 8-pin (150W) and PCIe slot on the motherboard (75W).

And speaking of power, despite the power limit at 225W, you’ll still be able to slightly overclock the RTX 4070 Verto Epic-X as long as the power draw is still within the limit. PNY did have its own proprietary software, the VelocityX OC Software to get the job done but I’ll leave that for you to decide because I’d just let it run at default settings and would really bother to increase the clock speed.

The display output options are pretty much the same as the rest, the usual 3 x DisplayPort and 1 X HDMI combo that is commonly seen on majority of the graphics cards nowadays.

Test System Setup

As mentioned at the beginning of this article, we’ve tested RTX 4070 Verto Epic-X against the RTX 3080 OC, RTX 4070 Ti, and RTX 4070 Founders Edition to gauge the performance of this card. For our games benchmark test, we’ve selected a number of AAA titles to run at their highest possible settings using the following setup under an ambient temperature of 28°C:

Games Benchmark – Raster Performance

If we exclude demanding titles like Watch Dogs Legion and Cyberpunk 2077, I would say that the RTX 4070 Verto Epic-X is still pretty capable when it comes to 4K gaming. The same goes for the RTX 3080 OC, which is still a powerful card even today. As we can see from these graphs, the RTX 4070 Verto Epic-X can be seen trading blows with the factory-overclocked 3080 when it comes to raster performance.

NVIDIA is pushing for 1440P resolution with this GPU, so we can easily get mostly 100fps or more on most of the titles tested with the RTX 4070. While we can see that the RTX 4070 Verto Epic-X performs very similarly to the Founders Edition model and sometimes better than the RTX 3080, there are titles where it just doesn’t perform any better than the two. However, there are some exceptions where the differences are just not that significant.

The RTX 3080 and RTX 4070 are both capable of handling 1080P gaming without any issues. However, I still see no reason to purchase these cards just to play games on 1080P because they can clearly do more than just 1080P.

Games Benchmark – Ray Tracing Performance

The RTX 4070 can handle 4K gaming to some extent with the help of DLSS. However, games like Cyberpunk 2077, Metro Exodus, and Watchdogs Legion are too demanding for it. In such cases, you can switch the DLSS preset to performance or balanced for reasonable 4K gaming. Although some details may be lost, it’s not very noticeable in fast-paced games unless you’re specifically looking for them.

Since it’s targeted for 1440P gaming, it’s no surprise to see that both cards performed well at 1440P resolution, similar to what we’ve seen in the raster performance test. Even demanding games like Cyberpunk 2077 ran at an average of 68fps, slightly better than the RTX 4070 Founders Edition and I consider this reasonably playable.

All the cards we tested performed well at 1080p resolution, which is pretty much expected after seeing what these cards are capable of in the higher resolution benchmarks.

DLSS 3 Hands-On

The main benefit of an RTX 40-series card in gaming is of course the new feature DLSS 3. With new technologies like frame generation and reflex enabled on top of DLSS, demanding games can see a significant performance boost, not just in fps but responsiveness as well.

The RTX 4070 can still handle a handful of games that has the DLSS 3 feature ready at 4K resolution. Though NVIDIA recommends 1440P resolution for the RTX 4070, where you can set graphics and ray tracing to the highest settings and enjoy the game at its fullest.

More games are adding DLSS 3 support every day but to use this feature, you’ll need an RTX 40-series card as it’s not available on previous-generation GPUs. This leaves users with RTX 30 series or older GPU no choice but to upgrade to the RTX 40 series GPU if they want to experience this new feature firsthand.

Synthetic benchmark

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In synthetic benchmarks like 3DMark and Unigine Superposition, which focus on game performance, the difference between the 4070 Founders Edition and RTX 4070 Verto Epic-X was smaller than expected. Both cards appear to have lower overall scores compared to the RTX 3080 across the test, which isn’t exactly what we’ve seen in the game benchmarks.

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In benchmarks that focus on content creation tasks like Blender, OctaneBench 2020 1.5, and V-Ray Benchmark 5, both RTX 4070 can be seen performing better than the RTX 3080 now. Though the differences between the RTX 4070 Founders Edition and RTX 4070 Verto Epic-X are still very minimal.

Thermals & Power Draw

Based on our previous tests with the RTX 4070 Founders Edition, it’s already proven that it is more power-efficient than the RTX 3080. The RTX 4070 Verto Epic-X for some reason, draws even lower power than the Founders Edition model, which peaked only at 196W. In contrast, the RTX 3080, which has similar game performance, peaked at 375W – almost double the peak power draw of the RTX 4070 Verto Epic-X.

As for the temperature, the differences are pretty much negligible and you can say that the cooler performance on the RTX 4070 Verto Epic-X works just like the Founders Edition model. The fan noise during load is much more noticeable this time, unlike the higher-end Verto Epic-X models which the fan noise is almost inaudible even during load.

Final thoughts

Performance-wise, while the RTX 4070 Verto Epic-X can be seen performing similarly to the RTX 3080 on some occasions but most of the time, it is on par with the Founders Edition model. Some users might argue that getting a used RTX 3080 is probably a better idea as it is way cheaper now, and I don’t 100% disagree with that. As they say, your money your choice, but if we look at the bigger picture, I still find the RTX 4070 the better choice when it comes to features and power efficiency.

The cooler might not be that impressive this time, but it still gets the job done and the card just runs perfectly fine. The use of PCIe 8-pin instead of 12VHPWR is another thing that is worth looking into, especially for those who are still using a power supply that doesn’t come with a dedicated 12VHPWR cable. Users who want bigger gains in overclocking the GPU might have to look for some other options, as you’re technically limited with 225W at most.

The price is RM3,149 and that is reasonable for the performance and features it offers. In addition to DLSS 3, it also has features like AV1 video encoding and RTX VSR video upscaling, which will be available on VLC Player. It also has AI-accelerated features for content creation tools, which are features that are not available on the RTX 30 series or older GPUs.

Where to buy? (Affiliate links)

• Amazon
• Lazada
• Shopee

By the way, all Malaysians, do keep an eye out for the yellow “FTS” sticker on the GPU. That signifies authenticity from the distributor and will be expedited for a speedy RMA process if anything goes wrong.

To get your warranty process, contact either of these two Facebook pages:

1. https://www.facebook.com/FTSMY/
2. https://www.facebook.com/PNYMalaysia