A40 PCIe vs GeForce RTX 3060 Max-Q

Primary details

GPU architecture, market segment, value for money and other general parameters compared.

Place in the rankingnot ratednot rated
Place by popularitynot in top-100not in top-100
ArchitectureAmpere (2020−2024)Ampere (2020−2024)
GPU code nameGA106GA102
Market segmentLaptopWorkstation
Release date12 January 2021 (3 years ago)5 October 2020 (4 years ago)

Detailed specifications

General parameters such as number of shaders, GPU core base clock and boost clock speeds, manufacturing process, texturing and calculation speed. Note that power consumption of some graphics cards can well exceed their nominal TDP, especially when overclocked.

Pipelines / CUDA cores384010752
Core clock speed817 MHz1305 MHz
Boost clock speed1282 MHz1755 MHz
Number of transistors13,250 million28,300 million
Manufacturing process technology8 nm8 nm
Power consumption (TDP)60 Watt300 Watt
Texture fill rate153.8589.7
Floating-point processing power9.846 TFLOPS37.74 TFLOPS
ROPs48112
TMUs120336
Tensor Cores120336
Ray Tracing Cores3084

Form factor & compatibility

Information on compatibility with other computer components. Useful when choosing a future computer configuration or upgrading an existing one. For desktop graphics cards it's interface and bus (motherboard compatibility), additional power connectors (power supply compatibility).

Laptop sizelargeno data
InterfacePCIe 4.0 x16PCIe 4.0 x16
Lengthno data267 mm
Widthno data2-slot
Supplementary power connectorsNone8-pin EPS

VRAM capacity and type

Parameters of VRAM installed: its type, size, bus, clock and resulting bandwidth. Integrated GPUs have no dedicated video RAM and use a shared part of system RAM.

Memory typeGDDR6GDDR6
Maximum RAM amount6 GB48 GB
Memory bus width192 Bit384 Bit
Memory clock speed1500 MHz1812 MHz
Memory bandwidth288.0 GB/s695.8 GB/s
Shared memory--

Connectivity and outputs

Types and number of video connectors present on the reviewed GPUs. As a rule, data in this section is precise only for desktop reference ones (so-called Founders Edition for NVIDIA chips). OEM manufacturers may change the number and type of output ports, while for notebook cards availability of certain video outputs ports depends on the laptop model rather than on the card itself.

Display ConnectorsNo outputs3x DisplayPort

API compatibility

List of supported 3D and general-purpose computing APIs, including their specific versions.

DirectX12 Ultimate (12_2)12 Ultimate (12_2)
Shader Model6.56.5
OpenGL4.64.6
OpenCL2.02.0
Vulkan1.21.2
CUDA8.68.6

Pros & cons summary


Recency 12 January 2021 5 October 2020
Maximum RAM amount 6 GB 48 GB
Power consumption (TDP) 60 Watt 300 Watt

RTX 3060 Max-Q has an age advantage of 3 months, and 400% lower power consumption.

A40 PCIe, on the other hand, has a 700% higher maximum VRAM amount.

We couldn't decide between GeForce RTX 3060 Max-Q and A40 PCIe. We've got no test results to judge.

Be aware that GeForce RTX 3060 Max-Q is a notebook card while A40 PCIe is a workstation one.


Should you still have questions concerning choice between the reviewed GPUs, ask them in Comments section, and we shall answer.

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NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Max-Q
GeForce RTX 3060 Max-Q
NVIDIA A40 PCIe
A40 PCIe

Comparisons with similar GPUs

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Community ratings

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3.5 185 votes

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4.6 88 votes

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