Well, it was a bit forced to begin with. One of the features of this overclocked version of the Nvidia RTX 3080 is the inclusion of a physical button that allows for easy overclocking of the card. The one-key OC button raises the clock from the standard reference boost clock of 1,710 MHz to a more attractive 1,785 MHz.
However, the first of the Colorful RTX 3080 samples sent by the company was more ambitious, attempting boosts well beyond the 1,800MHz mark, and the card almost inevitably tipped over. The original Nvidia driver was also quite aggressive, and included the now infamous SP capacitor. The second unit now in hand has a more modest clock speed increase and a redesigned capacitor layout on the back of the GPU, with MLCC capacitors in the mix.
If you can find one at a retailer, it is worth checking to see if the advertised One-key OC Boost clock is 1,785 MHz or higher. On Colorful's part, however, we are confident that the initial review samples are already complete.
However, there is another reason this RTX 3080 test has lagged behind previous third-party reviews. From time to time, we see new batches of the RTX 3080 on store shelves, but at this point we just buy what we can get our hands on and can't afford to be concerned with brand loyalty.
On the plus side, the RTX 3080's GA102 GPU is a great piece of graphics silicon, with the Nvidia Ampere architecture providing an incredible performance boost over the previous generation. As such, any card featuring Nvidia's flagship chip is a bargain, if you can get it at a reasonable price.
Colorful's overclocked RTX 3080 iGame Advanced OC has an MSRP of $799, a fairly hefty premium price before the "GPU recession" as we now call it. This is also nominally above the Asus RTX 3080 TUF OC and Palit RTX 3080 GamingPro versions we have already reviewed.
However, MSRP is largely irrelevant as prices are currently in a mess.
What is not irrelevant are the specs. iGame Advanced OC uses the same Nvidia Ampere silicon and thus has a GA102 GPU and 10GB of GDDR6X memory, but as mentioned earlier, the clock speed is increased up to 1,785MHz This has the potential to increase the clock speed to 1,785 MHz.
This puts the Colorful RTX 3080 iGame Advanced's OC operation at the top of our list not only in terms of overall clock speed, but also in terms of power consumption: in OC mode it averages 374W and peaks over 410W. To that end, it has three 8-pin PCIe power connectors in triple slots; those who found the funky 12-pins on Founders cards annoying will be annoyed by this.
Even without overclocking, the card is quite thirsty, with average power consumption roughly on par with the resolutely overclocked Asus TUF cards we tested. It's the only way to get gaming performance comparable to the excellent RTX 3080 Founders Edition or the nifty Palit RTX 3080 GamingPro.
Otherwise, standard gaming performance is a bit lacking compared to other RTX 3080 cards and the AMD RX 6800 XT.
However, with or without overclocking, the Colorful RTX 3080 iGame Advanced OC has serious cooling. The triple-slot, triple-fan cooler is no joke, and it doesn't lose out in the chip cooling department either: pushing the GPU higher than any other RTX 3080 we tested, the silicon never exceeds 67°C, and averages 64°C, certainly much lower than the much smaller reference card much cooler than the reference card design, which is certainly much smaller.
And it looks kinda cool too.
While we're not a big fan of the pulsating RGB LED fan in the center itself, you can make it a more pleasant solid magenta by selling the soul of your PC to install the Colorful control software.
But aesthetics are only a matter of the initial purchase-the moment you take it out of the box and feel justified in spending $1,000 on a hunk of gaming technology. After the card is installed in your machine, it is only after you get the performance that the card deserves that you realize that you bought a good card.
But right now, no one can pay for it. But if we are talking about buying a GPU relative to MSRP, I would still absolutely recommend buying a Founders Edition card for the obvious performance, restrained looks, and solid price point. Otherwise, I would be very tempted to find an RX 6800 XT for under $699.
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