Review – PNY GeForce RTX 4070 Ti 12GB OC XLR8 Verto Epic-X RGB TF

NVIDIA has finally launched the RTX 4070 Ti which will be available from January 5th onwards with a starting price of $799. As there will be no Founders Edition for this round, we’ll be taking a look at the RTX 4070 from the board partners instead. In this article, we will have our focus on the PNY GeForce RTX 4070 Ti 12GB OC XLR8 Verto Epic-X RGB TF.

While NVIDIA did specifically mention that the RTX 4070 Ti aimed at 1440P gaming, we believe that it can still do more than just 1440P gaming. So, we’ve tested the RTX 4070 Ti 12GB OC XLR8 Verto Epic-X RGB TF against the RTX 3090 and RTX 4080 for a quick performance gauge and to see what it’s truly capable of.

Specifications

Overview

Design-wise, the RTX 4070 Ti 12GB OC XLR8 Verto Epic-X RGB TF is pretty much identical to the higher-end RTX 4090 and RTX 4080 from the same series. This is not really a surprise, as we have already seen other board partners using the same cooler as the higher-end RTX 4080 and RTX 4090 on their RTX 4070 Ti.

The cooler might not be that appealing to those who fancies crazy-looking RGB lighting but it’s definitely one of the quietest and best-performing coolers in this generation. I’ve always wondered why PNY never mentioned anything about the design, the heatsink, and the cooling fans on their official product page even though they have an excellent cooler that can even outperform some of the designs from the popular brands.

Since the launch of the RTX 4090, 12VHPWR, or PCIe 5.0 power connector is inevitable. The good news is, the RTX 4070 Ti has a rated TGP of 285W and will only require a power supply with a minimum of 700W to run. For the RTX 4070 Ti 12GB OC XLR8 Verto Epic-X RGB TF, PNY actually included a rare 2 x PCIe 8-pin to 1 x 12VHPWR adapter in the box.

Unlike most of the RTX 4070 Ti that gives you a 3-to-1 adapter, the 2-to-1 adapter here is way better when cable management is taken into consideration. With the rated TGP at 285W, you can technically run the RTX 4070 Ti with two PCIe 8-pin without any compromise.

Although the backplate looks really similar to the one on the RTX 4090, there are slight differences in the cutout area. We can also see the actual size of the PCB from the location of the 12VHPWR connector, which is much smaller than what we expected.

For the display output, the RTX 4070 Ti 12GB OC XLR8 Verto Epic-X RGB TF comes with the standard 3 x DisplayPort and 1 X HDMI options.

Test System Setup

We have put together this review by testing the RTX 4070 Ti 12GB OC XLR8 Verto Epic-X RGB TF against the RTX 4080 and RTX 3090. 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:

For the test, we’re using the Intel Core i9-12900K, ASUS ROG Maximus Z690 APEX, and the Kingston Fury Beast RGB DDR5 memory kit mainly to minimize the chances of bumping into any performance bottleneck.

Games Benchmark – Raster Performance

Assassin’s Creed Valhalla

Control

Cyberpunk 2077

Far Cry 6

Forza Horizon 5

Hitman 3

Horizon Zero Dawn

Metro Exodus

Red Dead Redemption 2

Shadow of the Tomb Raider

Watch Dogs: Legion

Games Benchmark – Ray Tracing Performance

Control

Cyberpunk 2077

Far Cry 6

Forza Horizon 6

Hitman 3

Metro Exodus

Shadow of the Tomb Raider

Watch Dogs: Legion

DLSS 3 Hands-On

Now DLSS 3, it’s one of the main highlights of the RTX 40 series GPUs. Compared to how DLSS first started, the implementation is much more mature now and the adoption rate is looking really good. More titles are getting DLSS 3 support now and even existing titles like Portal, The Witcher 3, and Bright Memory Infinite have it now.

The most notable differences between DLSS 2 and DLSS 3 are the frame generation and reflex options that are only available if you’re using an RTX 40 series graphics card.  There are some notable artifacts on some of the objects and the UI part in some of the generated frames, but seeing how DLSS has progressed throughout the years, I’d say just give it some time and they will be sure to improve the algorithm to minimize the occurrence of these anomalies.

Synthetic Benchmark

For the synthetic benchmarks, we have the usual 3DMark, OctaneBench, Blender Benchmark, and V-Ray Benchmark for a quick performance gauge.

For productivity work related benchmarks like V-Ray, Blender, and OctaneBench, the RTX 4070 Ti can outperform the RTX 3090 most of the time. The only time when the RTX 3090 performs better is when it’s working on tasks that are more demanding on the VRAM i.e Blender Junkshop. So, as long as you can work out the balance between the GPU load and VRAM requirement, the RTX 4070 Ti can be a powerhouse for content creation and production as well.

Benchmarks that are used to gauge gaming performance like 3DMark and Superposition too are showing the same behavior as well. While the RTX 4070 Ti will outperform the RTX 3090 most of the time, a benchmark that goes beyond 4K resolution will require more VRAM like Superposition on 8K will benefit from the 24GB worth of VRAM on the RTX 3090.

Power and Thermals

Since we have already seen how well the cooler performs during our test with the RTX 4090 variant, it’s no surprise that the RTX 4070 Ti 12GB OC XLR8 Verto Epic-X RGB TF has a lower GPU load temperature that peaked only at  68°C. Both the GPU memory junction and hot spot temperature peaked at 72°C and 82°C respectively, which is actually lower than some of the other RTX 4070 Ti out there.

The load test also shows us that the peak power draw recorded is only at about 283W during synthetic tests. The actual power draw during gaming is about 20-30W lower, which is at about 260W mostly when we’re testing it with games like Cyberpunk 2077, Watch Dogs: Legion, Metro Exodus, etc that are more graphically demanding.

Final Thoughts

Despite being marketed as a graphics card 1440P gaming, I’d say that the RTX 4070 Ti is still capable of 4K gaming in a way if the game supports DLSS. If you don’t need that beefy 24GB worth of VRAM, the RTX 4070 Ti is better in terms of performance and futureproofing. The RTX 3090 is still a powerful graphics card that can go all out on 1440p gaming as well, but the RTX 4070 Ti will have a better advantage in the long run for future titles because of the new GPU architecture and DLSS 3.0 ready.

As far as cooling performance goes, I can hardly find any issue with the cooler because the cooler on the RTX 4070 Ti 12GB OC XLR8 Verto Epic-X RGB TF is technically the same as the RTX 4090 variant. It’s an excellent cooler that can even outdo some of the cooler designs from popular brands and I’m actually surprised to see that PNY doesn’t have any introduction on the cooler on their official product page. I think PNY should give us more information on the cooler design, given that they have done a really good job on it.

Price-wise, the local MSRP for the PNY GeForce RTX 4070 Ti 12GB OC XLR8 Gaming VERTO EPIC-X RGB TF is set at RM 4,489. It’s a little higher than what we’ve expected but I’d say it’s still justifiable based on the performance it can deliver, as well as the excellent cooler that PNY has to offer with this card. You can also opt for the base model PNY GeForce RTX 4070 Ti 12GB Verto TF, which is set at RM 4,149.

Where to buy? (Affiliate links)

• Amazon
• Lazada
• Shopee