Gigabyte RTX 4070 SUPER WINDFORCE OC Review & Benchmarks

Those looking to pick up a new GPU for 1440p gaming are faced with a bountiful set of options to choose from. With both AMD and NVIDIA constantly pumping out new options in an attempt to dominate this space, it is fairly evident that 1440p is a popular market for PC builders. And with the subsequent release of the RTX 4000 SUPER range, the market is heating up. Rivalling the popular RX 7800 XT, the RTX 4070 SUPER is a refresh of the existing RTX 4070 graphics card with some improved hardware and performance.

The RTX 4070 Ti SUPER and RTX 4080 SUPER will be launching alongside the RTX 4070 SUPER as high-end alternatives. Given how impressive the Ada Lovelace architecture has proved itself with other models, it makes perfect sense that NVIDIA are looking to capitalise on the solid hardware with some new cards.

In this review, we’ll be delving into the Gigabyte WINDFORCE OC edition of the RTX 4070 SUPER, evaluating its performance in a plethora of gaming benchmarks, with an assessment of whether this graphics card is a worthy alternative compared to the rest of the market.

Buy the Gigabyte RTX 4070 SUPER WINDFORCE OC on:

Specifications

NVIDIA’s RTX 4070 SUPER improves core counts and clock speed capability in comparison to the original RTX 4070 model. An important point to note, is that while the RTX 4070 Ti and RTX 4080 are end of life graphics cards, the RTX 4070 will still be in production after the launch of the RTX 4070 SUPER.

In terms of improvements, the RTX 4070 SUPER offers a 21% rise in CUDA cores offering 7168, instead of the 5888 available with the RTX 4070. RT cores and Tensor Cores have also seen an increase with a rise to 56 and 224 respectively. Power draw has also surged up to 220W, which isn’t that sharp of an increase versus the 200W TDP of the RTX 4070.

While video memory and bandwidth haven’t increased, the Gigabyte WINDFORCE OC variant does see an increase to the boost clock capability, up to 2.56GHz as opposed to the 2.48GHz rating that the Founders Edition offers. The RTX 4070 SUPER does seem to be lagging a bit behind the 16GB of VRAM that the RX 7800 XT provides, but we found that 12GB was more than sufficient across our 1440p benchmarks. While an extra 4GB of VRAM would prove useful as games become more demanding, in the present market, anything over 8GB is ample.

What is the RTX SUPER Range?

The RTX SUPER range of cards was first introduced back in 2019, after the initial RTX 2000 range. NVIDIA refreshed their existing RTX 2000 offerings by improving a number of specs, and rebranding them as ‘SUPER’ options. This line-up saw an uplift in performance across three graphics cards, with boosts to the core counts, along with a memory improvement on the RTX 2060 SUPER.

The RTX 4000 range of SUPER cards employ a similar approach, but instead of incorporating the RTX 4060 into the mix, we’ve instead got the RTX 4070, RTX 4070 Ti, and RTX 4080 receiving SUPER refreshes. While NVIDIA may decide to revitalise the lower-end cards later in the year, there’s no official confirmation thus far. The most promising element of the RTX 4000 SUPER range, is an adjusted set of prices making them more competitive than their predecessors. This also includes a price drop for the existing RTX 4070 card across a range of retailers.

The price adjustments do make sense to us. The main criticism of the RTX 4000 range was the staggering price difference compared to the rest of the market, so this isn’t a shock that NVIDIA are recouping popularity among buyers. The RTX 4070 SUPER offers stronger performance at the same price as its predecessor, making it a solid contender within the mid-range market, competing against the RX 7800 XT.

The RTX 4080 SUPER also sees a price drop of $200, down to $999 as its MSRP, aligning it with AMD’s top performer – the RX 7900 XTX. The RTX 4070 Ti SUPER is the only card from the three that retains its $799 price point. This is understandable however, based on the fact that the RTX 4070 Ti SUPER is receiving an increase in VRAM. This shows that NVIDIA are recovering the cost that comes with this significant upgrade.

Design

We’ve taken a look at a range of RTX 4070 SUPER models, highlighting the key differences between them in our roundup of the Best RTX 4070 SUPER graphics cards. The main focus of this review is Gigabyte’s WINDFORCE OC variant, a triple-fan design which also sits at MSRP. From a glance, the Gigabyte RTX 4070 SUPER WINDFORCE OC edition looks to be the only triple-fan model that also comes with an MSRP launch price, so this is immediately a good start. While the WINDFORCE OC model is one of the more basic designs, the black shrouding looks great.

The front of the card sports an all-black design, alongside three black 80mm fans that utilise alternate spinning to increase airflow pressure. The front shroud does offer some etchings that provide a futuristic look, which adds to the overall flair of the card.

The top and rear of the Gigabyte RTX 4070 SUPER WINDFORCE OC remain consistent in the simplistic design. The top of the card sports the same black colouring, which is consistent across the entire card.. The back of the graphics card offers a lighter grey colouring, with some more etchings and futuristic livery. The heatsink fins are also visible through the back. Opening up this area of the card allows air to easily pass through, providing better heat dissipation.

While I do like the fact that the Gigabyte RTX 4070 SUPER WINDFORCE OC is a triple-fan card, the overarching aesthetic is very simple. Gigabyte have made the card mostly black, which aligns with the same design approach we’ve seen on the Founders Edition model. The black style will help this card blend in well with most build aesthetics which is a plus, but there’s not much on the design front that’s particularly interesting.

Admittedly this is an MSRP card, which will explain most of the reasoning for keeping things simple, but I’d say if you’re looking for a fancier graphics card, there are alternatives that will be better suited to your PC build.

Performance

To assess performance of the Gigabyte RTX 4070 SUPER WINDFORCE OC, our in-house benchmarker Harry Coleman has put all of our RTX 4070 SUPER options through their paces within a plethora of benchmarks. Our testing within this article primarily focuses on the sheer differences between each model, as opposed to a comparison versus the rest of the market. However, we’ve put together a table below that highlights worthy alternatives to the RTX 4070 SUPER that are worth keeping an eye on.

Cyberpunk 2077

Settings: 1440p, Shadow Quality High, Indirect Lighting High, Reflections High, Crowd Density High, Particle Quality High, Volumetric Lighting High, Motion Blur off, GTAO Quality High, Grass Quality High, Contact Shadows High VSync Off, DLSS: On/Off, Ray Tracing: On/Off, Textures: High

In Cyberpunk 2077 at 1440p high, we ran two different benchmarks, one with ray tracing and DLSS, and one without. In the rasterized benchmark, the ASUS Dual RTX 4070 SUPER OC came out on top, offering 105FPS on average. Admittedly it was a 1 frame lead above the other cards, where performance is very close together.

In the ray tracing benchmark, Gigabyte’s WINDFORCE option comes out on top, leading the fore with 89FPS on average. We imagine this is down to the triple-fan design, keeping a lid on thermals, minimising any thermal throttling while ray tracing is enabled.

Alan Wake II

Settings: 1440p, Post-Processing High, Texture Resolution High, Texture Filtering High, Volumetric Lighting High, Global Illumination Quality High, Shadow Detail High, Terrain Quality High, Ray-Tracing: Enabled, Ray Tracing Preset High, DLSS: Enabled, Frame Generation: On

In Alan Wake 2, we ran a similar benchmark to Cyberpunk, one with ray tracing and DLSS, and one without these. Our results were closely aligned with our Cyberpunk 2077 runs, where the ASUS Dual seems to come out on top within rasterized games. However, the ASUS Dual RTX 4070 SUPER OC, also offered a 97FPS average when ray tracing was enabled, putting it at the top.

The Founders and Palit cards seem to be the weaker options of the four we’ve tested, but our results are so close together that the frame difference would effectively be negligible.

Warzone

Settings: 1440p, DLSS: On/Off, Texture Resolution High, Texture Filter Anisotropic High, Level of Detail High

In Warzone at 1440p high, our framerates saw a slight boost in performance across all of the cards, with the Gigabyte WINDFORCE OC model offering 144FPS, reaching that 144Hz sweet spot that is pivotal in a fast-paced title like this.

When we switched on DLSS 3.0, both the ASUS and Gigabyte cards sat at the top of the results, offering nearly 200FPS between them. This goes to show the power of DLSS 3 in this particular benchmark, as framerates jumped up by around 50FPS when we switched it on.

F1 2022

Settings: 1440p, Ray Tracing: On/Off, Lighting Quality Ultra High, Post Process High, Shadows Ultra High, Weather Effects Ultra High, Ambient Occlusion HBAO+, Asynchronous Compute On, Texture Streaming Ultra High, Anisotropic Filtering 8x, DLSS: On/Off

For our final head to head benchmark, we ran F1 2022 at 1440p high settings. In this benchmark, the Founders surprisingly came out on top in terms of rasterized performance. Strangely the cards seem to have reversed places, with the ASUS Dual losing out to the Founders RTX 4070 Super by about 7FPS in total.

When we switched on ray tracing and DLSS, the Founders yet again came out on top, offering 191FPS on average. Perhaps F1 2022 seems to prefer slower clock speeds, as thermals aren’t able to reach such high levels.

Cost Per Frame

While the raw performance of each card is also worth taking a look at, we’ve analysed the cost per frame of the RTX 4070 SUPER compared against the rest of the market. The graphs below used the framerate average within Apex Legends and Hogwarts to assess cost per frame at 1440p.

Apex Legends

In Apex Legends, our cost per frame for the RTX 4070 SUPER sits at 2.55. When compared to the rest of the market, the RTX 4070 SUPER is a solid option. At 5th place in our graph, the 4070 SUPER aligns quite closely with the RX 7700 XT, and 4060 Ti. With an MSRP of $599, we were pretty impressed that the 4070 SUPER was able to beat out the RX 7700 XT. Unfortunately, the RTX 4070 SUPER wasn’t able to dethrone the RX 7800 XT from its 2.15 cost per frame rating, but it isn’t insanely far off.

Hogwarts Legacy

In Hogwarts Legacy we did see the data shift, with graphics cards also changing places too. The RTX 4070 remained steadfast, holding its position just above the RTX 4060 Ti, but sitting below the RTX 4070. With a cost per frame of 5.76, this is still very strong considering the MSRP of this card. This goes to show that there’s definitely some performance improvements that have come with this card, but the demand of Hogwarts Legacy has increased the cost across all of the cards within this graph.

The RX 7800 XT and RX 7700 XT however remain at the top, sitting at a sub-$5 cost per frame, when compared to all of the alternatives. Regardless, this is still a strong showing from the RTX 4070 SUPER.

Is RTX 5000 Worth Waiting For?

While we wouldn’t normally address potential future GPU launches, but with a multitude of cards receiving a mid-life refresh, it makes sense to briefly address this point. The prospect of a potential RTX 5000 range of graphics cards is rather enticing, and one that many buyers will look to weigh up when choosing their next upgrade. The newest rumours indicated ‘Blackwell’ to be the code name for this new range of cards, launching towards the end of 2024, or at the start of 2025.

Although we’re not able to accurately assess performance for these potential GPUs, the pattern of recently release from both AMD and NVIDIA indicates that a future RTX 5000 range of cards isn’t likely to offer dominating performance boosts.

Games have become extremely demanding within the past couple of years, to the point where graphics cards aren’t offering extremely impressive metrics in some of the more recent triple A titles. For this reason and others, GPUs almost need to catch up to the current market of games, where performance will supersede the current demand. It it worth noting that the graphics card landscape is extremely competitive, making now a perfect time to pick up a new GPU.

Conclusion