There are reports today that Nvidia is going to be releasing a new variant of its GeForce RTX 5070 graphics card with a cut-down GB203 GPU instead of the GB205 chip it originally launched with. Could this be good news for consumers? Well, no and maybe.
The idea behind using bigger chips to fill out the inventory of smaller cards basically gives manufacturers something to do with graphics processors that don’t have enough functional units to power a bigger card. Here we’re talking about the same GPU as that used in the far more powerful RTX 5070 Ti and RTX 5080 graphics cards.
The RTX 5070 doesn’t currently use the full GB205 die, but its complement of 6144 CUDA cores isn’t far off the maximum of 6400 the full chip can offer, so it already has some failsafe headroom built in. Compare that with the GB203 used by the RTX 5080 and that card is using the full silicon package of its chip. That could maybe be seen as quite a gamble on the yields coming from the TSMC 4N process, but it is mature, and Nvidia already has the RTX 5070 Ti, with its 8960 CUDA cores to mop up any GPUs that don’t quite fit the full RTX 5080 bill.
But what’s a GPU manufacturer to do if there a a bunch of chips from a wafer that can’t fit into even an RTX 5070 Ti’s cut-down CUDA core requirement? That’s where this proposed new RTX 5070 would come in, taking that bigger core, chopping it down to 6144 cores and giving it a new badge.
So yes, don’t expect that because it’s using a bigger chip that the corresponding RTX 5070 would be any quicker or more powerful, or have a bigger memory bus. Nvidia has done this sort of thing in the recent past—the RTX 5060 has its own GB205 variant—and hasn’t given it any greater performance for the privilege of having higher quality silicon at its heart.
The 5070 uses the GB203 core.new driver drops tomorrow.September 8, 2026
GPU price tracking
I’ve been tracking the lowest price of each GPU in this generation since August 14, 2025
Lowest pricing (Price, $)
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Week
Nvidia RTX 5070Nvidia RTX 5060 Ti 16 GB
Lowest pricing Data
Timestamp (Week)
Nvidia RTX 5070 (Price, $)
Nvidia RTX 5060 Ti 16 GB (Price, $)
1
550
430
2
550
430
3
524
430
4
546
430
5
481
430
6
499
379
7
520
430
8
500
430
9
500
430
10
480
430
11
489
400
12
500
400
13
527
420
14
540
420
15
499
430
16
499
430
17
549
430
18
540
450
19
549
450
20
620
520
21
620
520
22
620
520
23
630
520
24
625
520
25
630
550
26
604
550
27
640
570
28
630
515
29
636
500
30
630
500
31
599
500
32
599
515
33
599
490
34
599
550
35
599
550
36
599
550
37
599
570
38
599
570
39
599
570
40
599
565
41
560
560
42
550
570
43
755
650
44
763
780
45
800
773
46
759
570
The recent price spike for both the RTX 5070 and RTX 5060 Ti 16 GB make it tough recommendation against the relatively new RX 9070 GRE.
And just because it’s using cast-off GPUs don’t expect it to be any more affordable, either. With the RTX 5070 currently retailing for around $800 you can see why Nvidia would be keen to ensure there’s good supply of this fourth-tier card when its retailing for so far beyond its $549 MSRP.
Is there any benefits for us PC gamers? If you wanted to be very, very optimistic (as is my wont) then you could say that at least this is going to deliver more supply of the RTX 5070 into the channel. But pricing is unlikely to trend downwards, so there will just be more cards to spend $800 on.
Given that, I wouldn’t be surprised to see a variant of the RTX 5060 Ti 16 GB, another ~$800 graphics card, coming out soon using some more of the sweepings off the original RTX 5070 factory floor. If it’s good enough for an RTX 5060, it’s good enough to turn into an RTX 5060 Ti, after all.
