Nvidia has made bold claims about its new GeForce RTX 5090 graphics card, stating that it is twice as fast as the previous model, the GeForce RTX 4090. However, there is a significant catch. To achieve this performance boost, users need to turn on various features, including Nvidia’s DLSS Multi Frame Generation.
DLSS allows games that support it to see massive increases in frame rates by up to eight times compared to traditional rasterization alone. However, not all games support DLSS, which limits its effectiveness. According to Nvidia’s own graphs, the RTX 5090 offers around 20-40% increases in performance over the RTX 4090, not twice as fast.
The performance claims are based on the new DLSS Multi Frame Generation technology, which generates up to three frames for every traditionally rendered frame, increasing performance by eight times. However, this feature requires users to turn on various bells and whistles, making it less accessible.
To determine the actual performance of the RTX 5090, benchmark results are necessary when the card is released later this month. The jury is out on how well the new techniques will perform in games like Microsoft Flight Simulator, which can benefit from increased frame rates.
Nvidia’s ecosystem is growing, with over 700 titles supporting its RTX features and over 40% of Steam users using desktop Nvidia RTX capable graphics cards. Despite some doubts about the technology, it’s clear that Nvidia’s RTX features are here to stay, with 1% market share for the RTX 4090 and Nvidia making up over 75% of overall graphics cards used on Steam.
Source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/antonyleather/2025/01/08/nvidias-rtx-5090-twice-as-fast-as-the-rtx-4090-but-theres-a-catch