NVIDIA RTX 4090 Power usage can be significantly tamed while still delivering most of the performance you’d get at default levels, according to some recent testing.
Quasarzone (Opens in a new tab) Tests were performed (as marked by hardware times (Opens in a new tab)) to ascertain what frame rates the RTX 4090 managed in a selection of five games at 4K (maximum detail) at its ready settings – and a power usage of 347W – before comparing it to what Photographers card Press with manually adjusted power limit down by steps.
Limiting power usage to 326W (80% power limit setting) kept frame rates at 99.1% compared to the default setting, and further decreasing to 305W (70%) preserved 97.8% performance. In all honesty, most people won’t even notice a 2% difference.
So, the takeaway here is that if you have an RTX 4090, it’s very easy to adjust the power limit and get it down to the 300W level without making any noticeable difference to your FPS (frames per second).
Even at 60% maximum power level, which pulls out 268W, frame rates were 93.9% which is still a long way off pace.
Bearing in mind this is true at 4K for the games tested, and if you were wondering what it was, Quasarzone used the following titles: Cyberpunk 2077And Forza Horizon 5, Lost Ark, PUBG, and Spider-Man Remastered.
Analysis: No one would think of transformers…
Those who own an RTX 4090 – and there are quite a few enthusiast buyers who have taken the lead with a high-end GPU – are no doubt reading this with interest, especially given the controversy surrounding Nvidia’s flagship Lovelace and melt-blown transducer cases.
If you’re a little paranoid about this whole episode – and admittedly it only affects a very small number of GPUs according to Nvidia stats, though any at all is really too much – power limiting might be a useful solution to take. in consedration . Lowering power usage somewhat may help avoid any risk of damaging things with the adapter.
Not only that, but if doing so means less power use for substantially the same performance – it wouldn’t make a noticeable difference in your gaming experience to drop 2% FPS, realistically – so why not do it if you’re also watching your energy bills? . After all, there’s a cost-of-living crisis afoot, with energy bills too high for some people, so why not keep the energy consumed by Lovelace’s flagship to an acceptable minimum. While also undoubtedly helping to ensure gaming computer It’s easier to cool it down, for that matter.
An interesting point all this raises is that the RTX 4090’s TGP set at 450W certainly leaves an enormous amount of headroom when you consider that the RTX 4090 can actually run at 300W – two-thirds of that amount – while still delivering excellent levels of performance. . Although compared to an overclocked RTX 4090, rather than one at default settings, the power-limited main GPU would be something different, of course.
However, looking at this test makes you wonder if it would have been wise for Nvidia to soften the default settings a bit more.
Quasarzone is also looking to reduce the impact of the RTX 4090, which can provide better results than the power limit, but dealing with it is very difficult, while adjusting the power limit is a very simple task. So for most people, the convenience of being able to do it quickly and easily far outweighs the incremental gain from less effort – and the difference isn’t huge either, it should be noted, with limited energy still providing great results.