Review: MSI GeForce RTX 2080 Ti DUKE (is this Duke the new King?)

by Hilbert Hagedoorn on: 09/21/2018 03:03 PM | source: | 41 comment(s)

Arguably the best GeForce RTX 2080 Ti we have tested is the DUKE from MSI, in this review we'll take it through our testing paces to see how the card holds up against the other cards in the deck.

Read our review right here.

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Darkiee
Senior Member

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#5587531 Posted on: 09/21/2018 03:54 PM

That is quite impressing OC with the OC scanner. Recon it has something to do with MSI cranking up the power limit?

It´s a great looking card, performs good, and even better when OC´d.

Solid review, as always.

nevcairiel
Senior Member

Posts: 582
Joined: 2015-05-19

#5587540 Posted on: 09/21/2018 04:07 PM

Having both the Duke and the Trio seems a bit odd. It looks like a slightly slimmer Trio in another color scheme, and while the on-paper specs are not identical, the final performance basically is. So ultimately, the cards are very similar, and the price difference right now in Europe at least is only €30.

There must be some bigger differentiating factor that I'm missing here.

Glottiz
Senior Member

Posts: 464
Joined: 2006-11-18

#5587550 Posted on: 09/21/2018 04:38 PM

Gaming X TRIO is MSI's flagship product, kinda like Asus' STRIX.
There are some differences, between Duke and TRIO. TRIO has heavier beefier cooler and it shows in temp/noise comparisons.
Duke 74C @ 39 dBA
TRIO 73C @ 37 dBA

Petr V
Senior Member

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#5587551 Posted on: 09/21/2018 04:43 PM

Lightning will be king

maddog55
Member

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Joined: 2014-10-06

#5587566 Posted on: 09/21/2018 05:08 PM

All very nice MSI,but where is my favourite RED colour scheme?...my 1080 Gaming X in Black /Red is a wee cracker.....these RTX cards are "One Step Beyond" what i would be willing to pay for a decent graphics card...

Built a new system late last year based on Ryzen 7 1700/ Crosshair Hero v1 and a new monitor Asus ROG Swift PG278...so had to budget on my graphics card...probably wait 'till RYZEN 2 7nm before i build another new system.

Solfaur
Senior Member

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#5587567 Posted on: 09/21/2018 05:09 PM

I'm glad Hilbert came to the same conclusion after this in-depth review as I did simply from looking at the two cards, this and Gaming Trio, when pictures first leaked. The Gaming Trio is plain ugly (though do kind of like the backplate). I expected better cooling, but I guess it's just a matter of more RGB? Oh well... I for one am NOT looking forward to the Lightning this time around, as that one will be even more insanely expensive.

ops:

H83
Senior Member

Posts: 2691
Joined: 2009-09-08

#5587591 Posted on: 09/21/2018 05:49 PM

I have the 1080Ti Duke that i love because it´s an amazing card, and because i got it for free, so i´m very pleased to read that the new Duke is as good or even better. Kudos for MSI for making a card like this! Too bad they ruined the gaming version, i had a 970 Gaming and it was also a great card but this one...
Also i have to agree with those that say that the Gaming and Duke versions are simply too close to make sense.

Hilbert, is this card going to be included in the next christmas giveaway?

Reddoguk
Senior Member

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#5587600 Posted on: 09/21/2018 06:02 PM

This time around you are basically just paying extra for the 3rd party cooling because the 10-15% extra you used to get from factory OC'd cards is absent.

schmidtbag
Senior Member

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#5587608 Posted on: 09/21/2018 06:16 PM

I have no problem with this card, but I don't really understand the obsession behind it. In the last article discussing the Duke, everyone was fawning over it like it was the best looking GPU to have ever existed. Sure, it looks good, but it's not that special. I personally think the reference cooler is more interesting (not necessarily better looking, just more eye-catching).

This time around you are basically just paying extra for the 3rd party cooling because the 10-15% extra you used to get from factory OC'd cards is absent.

Well, the reference cooler is barely adequate even for stock speeds. I think MSI realizes that people who buy this have the intention to overclock, so even if it came pre-OC'd people would just push it further anyway, in which case, why should they bother? Besides, now that Nvidia is basically binning OC and non-OC chips, it's pretty much guaranteed that you should get decent results with one of the OC-able models.

insp1re2600
Senior Member

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#5587667 Posted on: 09/21/2018 09:27 PM

Good review, preordered mine today, and it cant come soon enough as using a 1030 2gb till it arrives, due to more than half the cost being covered by my sale of the 1080ti.

Koniakki
Senior Member

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#5587684 Posted on: 09/21/2018 10:38 PM

Thanks boss for the review!

Looks like a great card! But I have to put this here because....

...this card costs €1300
!!

Pimpiklem
Senior Member

Posts: 162
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#5587714 Posted on: 09/22/2018 12:12 AM

Worries me.
all we will here now is this RTX gameworks feature empowering Nvidia to push their agenda and gamers who are pushing it forward are the people who will be suffering from the fall out of its implementation into games. Problem isnt the tech problem is the hidden agenda to cripple performance for competitors creating fake results.
It feels like a mixed bag of good and bad whith anything nvidia does.

JGF
Junior Member

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#5587760 Posted on: 09/22/2018 04:22 AM

Hi Hilbert,

With all the extensive power draw testing you did, all at the wall apparently, did any of your 2080Ti *systems* exceed 500 watts at the wall? Or approach even?

Reason I ask is I have a high quality 550W Seasonic Gold PS supply with a non overclocked 4790K cpu and a non overclocked 980GTX. This system consumes at most a little over 300 watts at the wall even though at the time it was recommended the system have a 450 watt power supply. I'm real curious if I could still use the existing system with a 2080Ti.

Sure they recommend a 650W supply but I'm not sure I believe that thats neccessary given my current systems draw (ie is the 2080Ti really going to draw 200 watts more than a 980GTX)... again not an overclocker at all but a happy gamer. Rest of system is just 16gig ram and 3 SSD's. The online power supply estimators estimate my system with a Titan V at around 475 watts so that's still 75 watts of headroom at full load I figure.

Thoughts?

Babel-17
Senior Member

Posts: 116
Joined: 2001-12-07

#5587783 Posted on: 09/22/2018 06:21 AM

Lol, it's only because I read an article explaining the naming of the card that I get the joke. IIRC MSI did have Duke Nukem in mind, and Hail to the King is one of his catch phrases. Nice one!

Hilbert Hagedoorn
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#5587790 Posted on: 09/22/2018 07:07 AM

With all the extensive power draw testing you did, all at the wall apparently, did any of your 2080Ti *systems* exceed 500 watts at the wall? Or approach even?

No, but the Trio is close due to its increase power limited. 550W is on the edge of things I'd say, but with a non-OCed and tweaked setup you should be okay. You can math it up, ~ 275 Watts + ~ 100 Watts for your CPU + 35 Watts chipset and then add your components (pcie cards / SSDs/ HDDs).

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