NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980M vs NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 Max-Q vs NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070 Super (Desktop)

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 with Max-Q design is the power saving variant of the mobile GeForce RTX 2060. Therefore it is a high end gaming graphics card for thin laptops. It is based on the same chip as the RTX 2060 but with reduced clock speeds and a lower power consumption. It was released in 2020 with the Zephyrus G14 gaming laptop.

With the refresh, Nvidia also reworked the Max-Q technologies for more efficiency. Low Voltage GDDR6 (lower clocked but more headroom for the GPU) and improved regulator efficiency should improve the performance per Watt. Two new optional features can also be implemented by the OEM. Max-Q Dynamic Boost is able to shift power from the CPU to the GPU on a per frame basis to increase overall performance. Furthermore, the laptop manufacturer can also implement Advanced Optimus with a dynamic display switch (hardware) to enable Optimus, G-SYNC and high refresh rate displays (up to 4K 120 Hz).

The clock is not the only difference compared to the regular GTX 2060 though. The drivers for the Max-Q version were optimized for efficiency (and not performance; only for Max-Q models), there are optimized voltage converters for 1V operation, high-end cooling methods, and a 40 dB limit for the fan noise (with clock adjustments to ensure this at all times).

The performance should be only slightly below the normal RTX 2060 due to the decreased clock rates. It should be most suited for 1080p gaming at maximum detail level. Raytracing features however may reduce framerates a lot, so using raytracing will be limited to some games.

The chip is specified at a TGP of around 65 Watt and therefore clearly lower than the 80 - 90 Watt of the regular RTX 2060 Mobile.

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070 Super (RTX 2070S) is a high-end desktop graphics card and refresh of the 2018 RTX 2070. The card is now behind the RTX 2080 Ti and RTX 2080 Super (upcoming) as the third-fastest graphics card in the Nvidia lineup of consumer cards. It uses the big TU104 chip instead of the TU106 of the RTX 2070 and offers more cores (2,560 versus 2,304).

Features

NVIDIA manufactures the TU104 chip on a 12 nm FinFET process and includes features like Deep Learning Super Sampling (DLSS) and Real-Time Ray Tracing (RTRT), which should combine to create more realistic lighting effects than older GPUs based on the company's Pascal architecture can (if the games supports it). The RTX 2070S is DisplayPort 1.4 ready, while there is also support for HDMI 2.0b, HDR, Simultaneous Multi-Projection (SMP) and H.265 video en/decoding (PlayReady 3.0).

Performance

The performance of the RTX 2070S is slightly better than the old GeForce GTX 1080 Ti. With the new ray-tracing and tensor cores, the RTX 2070S is clearly the better choice. The RTX 2070 Super is positioned in the high-end segment and therefore most current games should run fluently in 4k and high detail settings (but without ray tracing). Compared to AMD offerings, the RTX 2070 Super is aimed against the AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT (Navi).

Power Requirements

NVIDIA estimates that the RTX 2070S should consume a maximum of 215 W (RTX 2070 - 175 Watt). In our gaming tests, the RTX 2070 Super was more power-efficient than the old GeForce GTX 1080 Ti (339 versus 296 Watt for the test system running The Witcher 3).