Final words and conclusion
Performance
Of course, the GeForce RTX 3090 is a product that does not need to make sense and cannot disappoint in that department, albeit we feel the RTX 3080 obviously offers more value for money. As mentioned, you need to feed the card what it needs, a GPU bound game preferably at Ultra HD. NVIDIA claims this card is even capable of running games at 8K; however, we cannot objectively test that. At Full HD, you'll be quite often bottlenecked and CPU limited. But even there, in some games with proper programming and the right API (DX12/ASYNC compute), the sheer increase in performance is breathtaking. The good old rasterizer engine rips right through the threshold of extreme performance. All thanks to the 10.4K Shading processors. Performance-wise we can safely state that this is a true Ultra HD capable graphics card, which it should be at this retail price. But whether or not you use traditional rendering or games that can be ray-traced and manage DLSS, it's all coming together in that UHD resolution. Battlefield V with ray-tracing and DLSS enabled, in Ultra HD now running in that 86 FPS bracket. DXR ray-tracing and Tensor performance; the RTX 30 series has received new Tensor and RT cores. So don't let the actual RT and Tensor core count confuse you. They're located close inside that rendering engine, they became more efficient, and that shows. If we look at an RTX 2080 with port Royale, we will hit almost 30 FPS. The RTX 3090 doubles that at over 60 FPS. Tensor cores are harder to measure, but overall from what we have seen, it's all in good balance. Overall though, the GeForce RTX 3080 starts to make sense starting at a Quad HD resolution (2560x1440), the RTX 3090 Ultra HD at (3840x2160), it is that simple. Games like Red Dead Redemption 2 will make you trigger happy at close to 80 FPS in UHD resolutions with the very best graphics settings. As always, comparing apples and oranges, the performance results vary here and there as each architecture offers advantages and disadvantages in certain game render workloads.
Cooling & noise levels
The SUPRIM X series offers a twofold of BIOSes. The default is SILENT mode. ANd at 33~34 DBa, we have to admit, gosh, this thing is silent! Remember it has a 420 Watt TGP, and that requires serious real-estate cooling wise. The compromise is that the temperatures run closer to 80 degrees C in this mode. Not an issue whatsoever for the card, but we know and understand that end-users will always get that ease of mind if the card runs below 75 Degrees C. Your alternative option is the GAMING bios setting. Here performance drops under 70 Degrees C, which is terrific; however, your acoustic noise level will rise towards 39 DBa. That's still somewhat silent, but yes, you'll hear airflow. I really feel that the SUPRIM X series needs to have a silent mode that offers temps at the 75 C range, much like the TRIO series offer. Then again, leave it at SILENT mode, and accept that 80 Degrees C value would be my advice. Please do make sure you have a properly ventilated chassis, though, that 450 Watts of heat is mostly ditched inside your chassis and needs the be exhausted.
Energy
NVIDIA is listing their TGP at 350 Watt for the FE. This card is advertised to have a 420 Watt TGP. Our measured total board power is close to 450 Watts. Add to that any tweaks you might apply, and you're closing in at 500 Watts. I am not comfortable with this level of power consumption, no matter how I look at it. This value alone would be reason enough to pick a lower class product like 3080.
Coil whine
Where the FE produces some, we had a hard time detecting coil whine on this card. Graphics cards all make this in some form, especially in high framerates this can be perceived. In a closed chassis, that noise fades away in the background.
Pricing
NVIDIA is pricing the GeForce RTX 3090 at USD 1499. It's an excessive amount of money for something to play PC games on. This product is so exclusive that it creates its own niche. This AIB card will get listed at € 1750 with a similar number in USD. But if availability is low, we can easily see the prices hike to the sub-2000 EUR/USD marker.
Tweaking
Tweaking Ampere GPUs have been a bit of a challenge; however, the SUPRIM X seems to be designed for that. It was quite easy to tweak, really. We added a 7% on power distribution, raised the offset clock frequency by 125 MHz, and have been ably to add 1600 Mhz on the memory clock resulting in 21.1 GHz. The end result is roughly 9 to 10% additional performance coming from the reference product. And that makes this the most tweakable 3090 card we tested to date.
Conclusion
MSI offers a beautifully designed graphics card both from an aesthetic point of view, as well as the component selection and this hardware build. At a going price of 1750 USD, the card obviously will be a hard sell; as for that money, you really should look into a 3080 at half the price. One of the problems the SUPRIM X runs into is the limiters that NVIDIA enforces. Long story short, the premium AIB cards all perform 1%, maybe 2% away from each other in raw performance. This 3090 SUPRIM X, as a result, sits 3 to 4% above reference performance. For the 250 USD price differential seen from reference, you really need to wonder if that's worth it. Though, we do have to say that this card is the best tweaker we've tested to date for any 3090. Overall we boosted performance close to 10% measures from the founder edition. So yeah, all is relative, of course. It's a gorgeous product none the less—gaming performance and, of course, rendering quality. My main concern is not performance, cooling, or even pricing. This card consumes close to 450 Watts of power, and relative to the extra performance you gain, that number is far too high for me to be a comfortable number. Many will disagree with me or do not care about power consumption. You need to game at Ultra HD and beyond for this card to make a bit of sense. We also recognize that the two factors do not need to make sense for many of you as the product sits in a very extreme niche. But I stated enough about that. I like this chunk of hardware sitting inside a PC, though, as no matter how you look at it, it is a majestic product. Please make sure you have plenty of ventilation, though, as the RTX 3090 will dump lots of heat. It is big, but it still looks terrific. Where I could nag a little about the 10GB VRAM on the GeForce RTX 3080, we can not complain even the slightest bit about the whopping big mac feature of the 3090. The card is formidable if you apply and give it the right circumstances. Aside from my remarks on pricing and power consumption, MSI did almost everything right with the SUPRIM X. Design and aesthetics are, of course, a subjective manner. We do like to looks, but that goes just as well for the Gaming X TRIO models. Performance-wise really, the two trade off perhaps 1% with each other here and there. So that is not the decisive factor to beat. Tweaking wise, this card is a gem. We love the dual BIOS feature but feel the GAMING BIOS mode is slightly too noisy for MSI standards and the SILENT BIOS mode a notch too hot for what is deemed commonly acceptable. However, my advice is to leave it at the default configured SILENT mode, under the assumption you have proper airflow inside your chassis, as this card needs to ditch 450 Watts of heat. The card easily is a top pick, but whether or not you can find one in the stores or people willing to check out this kind of cash for a GPU, well .. we're not sure about it. But my man, what beast.
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