NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 and NVLink: Everything You Need to Know
The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 is one of the most powerful graphics cards on the market, known for its impressive performance in gaming, 3D rendering, and deep learning tasks. One of its notable features is the NVLink support, which allows for enhanced performance through the connection of multiple RTX 3090 GPUs. In this article, we will explore whether the RTX 3090 supports NVLink and its implications for both gaming and professional workloads.
What is NVLink and Does the RTX 3090 Support It?
Indeed, the RTX 3090 enhances the power of multiple GPUs by supporting NVLink, which is NVIDIA's technology designed to bridge the gaps between multiple GPUs. This advanced inter-GPU technology can significantly boost performance in compatible applications, making the RTX 3090 an excellent choice for high-end gaming and professional tasks such as 3D rendering and deep learning. NVLink enables these GPUs to communicate and share data more efficiently, potentially unlocking greater performance than what a single GPU can offer.
NVLink Performance and Benefits
The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090, with its NVLink support, offers remarkable performance. Specifically, the RTX 3090 supports NVLink at 112.5 Gb/s, providing a bandwidth that is essential for advanced rendering, deep learning, and high-resolution gaming. It also features up to 69 TFLOPs in ray tracing and 285 TFLOPs in tensor cores, making it a powerhouse for both gaming and professional tasks.
SLI: A Feature on the Way Out
It's crucial to note that while the RTX 3090 supports NVLink, its feature known as SLI (Scalable Link Interface) is effectively dead. This fact was reaffirmed by NVIDIA's own announcements and testing, as well as by Linus Tech Tips (LTT).
LTT's testing revealed that using SLI for the RTX 3090 and similar cards from the Pascal generation and earlier does not yield the expected performance gains. In fact, it's been shown that using SLI can be slower than using a single RTX 3090 GPU. This indicates that the days of leveraging multiple GPUs through SLI for mainstream gaming and productivity are coming to an end.
Future Implications for Multi-GPU Configurations
NVIDIA has announced plans to disable NVLink on all gaming-grade GPUs, starting from January 2021. This decision reflects the company's commitment to promoting single-GPU setups, which are more efficient and provide better performance for most users. However, for professional use cases that require multiple GPUs, the RTX 3090 remains a viable option.
For enthusiasts and professionals who need to set up multiple RTX 3090 GPUs, an Extended ATX (EATX) motherboard is recommended. Models such as the MSI Creation and Unify are ideal for accommodating these configurations. It's important to note that while these setups can offer significant improvements, the gains in gaming are marginal at best. Therefore, for the majority of users, a single RTX 3090 GPU delivers top-tier performance.
Conclusion
In summary, the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 does support NVLink, making it a powerful choice for those who can benefit from multi-GPU configurations. However, due to the limitations of SLI and the shift towards single-GPU setups, it's essential to weigh the benefits against the realities of modern gaming and professional needs. As NVIDIA moves forward, multi-GPU technologies are likely to be confined to professional-grade applications, while single-GPU setups will continue to dominate the mainstream market.