NVIDIA has officially launched its highly anticipated GeForce RTX 50 series GPUs at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2025, held this week in Las Vegas. CEO Jensen Huang announced the new lineup during his opening keynote speech, emphasizing the breakthrough advancements brought by the "Blackwell RTX tech"—a leap forward meant to radically transform gaming and creative experiences.
"Blackwell, the engine of AI, has arrived for PC gamers, developers and creatives," Huang stated emphatically. He underlined the technological strides made, describing the integration of AI-driven neural rendering alongside conventional ray tracing. Huang hailed this as "the most significant computer graphics innovation since we introduced programmable shading 25 years ago." Indeed, the advancements are backed by substantial technological specifications, marking this launch as a pivotal moment for NVIDIA and the broader graphics industry.
The new Blackwell architecture is impressive, featuring approximately 92 billion transistors, 125 Shader Teraflops of performance, and 380 RT TFLOPS, alongside 4,000 AI TOPS and 1.8 terabytes per second of memory bandwidth. The flagship product, the GeForce RTX 5090, is equipped with 32GB of GDDR7 memory and retails at $1,999. Other offerings include the RTX 5080 at $999, the RTX 5070 Ti priced at $749, and the entry-level RTX 5070 at $549, the latter said to match the performance of the RTX 4090, yielding high expectations from gamers.
Justin Walker, NVIDIA's Senior Director of GeForce Products, articulated the company’s excitement about these new models. "This is probably the biggest thing to happen in the graphics since programming for shaders," he remarked, before elaborately detailing how the DLSS 4 technology works. According to Walker, DLSS 4 introduces Multi Frame Generation, allowing the technology to utilize AI to predict and generate multiple frames per rendered frame, facilitating frame rates up to eight times higher than traditional rendering methods. It enhances responsive gameplay and clarity, boasting performance levels like 247 FPS at significantly reduced latencies.
These GPUs aren’t just limited to desktop versions; NVIDIA also announced enhancements for laptops. The laptop counterparts of the RTX 50 series, beginning at $2,899 for the RTX 5090 and dropping to $1,299 for the RTX 5070, promise double efficiency and energy performance. Laptops will reportedly consume less power than their predecessors, boasting 40 percent more battery life.
Walker emphasized the merging of gaming and AI, stating, "The great thing about... our gaming side still benefits tremendously from the fact we are doing AI." This synergy has led NVIDIA to include additional features like NVIDIA Reflex 2, which could improve player responsiveness by predictive shading, effectively reducing the latency between player movements and on-screen actions by up to 75%.
Reflecting on the competitive gaming market, Huang highlighted the ability of the RTX 50 series GPUs to render highly realistic gaming experiences, with new DLSS technologies applied to popular titles like Cyberpunk 2077, promising resolutions beyond 4K at frame rates exceeding 200 FPS.
The RTX series also promises to support up to 75 gaming titles upon launch, boosting their market viability against competitors like AMD and Intel, who are both set to introduce budget-conscious options soon. NVIDIA continues to excel as the world's leading GPU manufacturer, capitalizing on the synergy of gaming and AI, and Walker noted this strategic direction is hugely beneficial.
NVIDIA's RTX 50 series marks not only the evolution of their well-known graphics cards but also the beginning of broader AI integration within gaming—a shift anticipated to redefine how games are presented and experienced. The expected release dates for these units likely span to late January for desktops, with availability for laptops projected for March 2025. The gaming community, investors, and tech enthusiasts alike are eagerly awaiting the implementation of this technology.
With even ambitious claims surrounding the performance capabilities of the RTX 50 series, NVIDIA's announcement at CES 2025 is set to shape the future of PC gaming and graphics processing significantly.