CONCLUSION

   Ever since i bought my very first graphics card back in 1995 (S3 ViRGE - up until then all my systems had Trident ones) i realized that graphics would go a long way (even more so when i got the Riva 128, Rage 3D and the 3DFX Voodoo cards). Still i was never much into graphics cards reviews, mainly because some of my colleagues are pretty darn good at it (and already have all the connections they could ever need). Still the combination of me not doing early launch reviews (which means far more mature drivers by the time i do test a card) and many of you asking meant i needed to start delivering and to that end i just had to check one of the RTX 2080 Super models out. So as expected the MSI GeForce RTX 2080 Super Gaming X Trio is the fastest model to arrive in the office/lab and since i seriously doubt I’ll be able to get my hands on an RTX 2080 Ti prior to the RTX 30XX line getting launched later this year this will probably be so for quite a while. Now as you can all see in our charts in terms of performance the GeForce RTX 2080 Super Gaming X Trio easily surpasses everything else in the charts including the previously reviewed Sapphire Radeon RX 5700 XT Nitro+ by an average of 20% (as low as 5% in some tests – do keep in mind however that Dreadnought seems to be capped for some reason - and as high as 40% in others) a number which for some people may not justify the massive difference in price but at the end of the day it’s still a significant gap in performance. On top of that electrical efficiency is at very high levels, overclocking headroom is quite good (although far from great) and the same goes for noise levels and temperatures so it’s not just performance that you’re getting from the GeForce RTX 2080 Super Gaming X Trio. In terms of design i can’t really find anything wrong with the GeForce RTX 2080 Super Gaming X Trio. I admit that I’d like individual control over all its RGB LEDs via the Dragon Center software but I’m probably nitpicking.

   The entire Covid-19 “crisis” hasn’t done any favours to the global economy/market and that includes graphics cards prices since the MSI GeForce RTX 2080 Super Gaming X Trio currently retails for no less than USD1147.99 inside the USA (Amazon.com) and 857Euros inside the EU (Amazon.co.uk). With this in mind even though pricing on the other side of the Atlantic is clearly absurd (you can find the clearly faster GeForce RTX 2080 Ti Gaming X Trio model for like USD150 more) over here things are better, not perfect (considering the GeForce RTX 2080 Super Gaming X Trio used to retail at just around 740Euros) but better. With price as its current drawback the GeForce RTX 2080 Super Gaming X Trio may not offer the best bang for your buck but it’s among the fastest cards in the world right now and that combined with its general performance are enough for our Platinum Award.

PROS

- Build Quality (Backplate / Reinforced Metal Frame)
- Excellent Performance
- Factory Overclock
- Good Overclocking Headroom
- Noise Levels / Power Consumption / Temperatures
- Looks (RGB System)
- Supported Technologies (Real Time Ray Tracing & Deep Learning Super Sampling)
- Bundled Card Support Bracket

CONS

- Price (Especially Current Ones)
- Size (3 Slot Card)