Nvidia has officially announced its next-generation RTX 50-series GPUs, including the highly anticipated RTX 5090 and RTX 5080, at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas. The new GPUs, unveiled by Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang during a keynote address, promise significant performance improvements and new features.

The RTX 50-series lineup consists of four new GPUs: the flagship RTX 5090 priced at $1,999, the RTX 5080 at $999, the RTX 5070 Ti at $749, and the RTX 5070 at $549. These GPUs are built on the new RTX Blackwell architecture and will be available starting in January.

One of the notable design changes in the RTX 50-series is the new Founders Edition, which features a unique design with two double flow-through fans, a 3D vapor chamber, and GDDR7 memory. This design is expected to provide improved cooling and performance.

During the CES keynote, Huang demonstrated the capabilities of the RTX 50-series GPUs with a real-time rendering demo that showcased several new features, including RTX Neural Materials, RTX Neural Faces, text-to-animation, and DLSS 4. The demo highlighted the significant performance gains and improved graphics quality of the new GPUs.

Huang emphasized the role of AI in revolutionizing the graphics industry, stating that "the new generation of DLSS can generate beyond frames, it can predict the future." This marks a significant shift in Nvidia's approach, as the company is now leveraging AI to enhance its GPUs, rather than the other way around.

The RTX 50-series announcement comes more than two years after the release of the RTX 4090 and RTX 4080, which were based on Nvidia's Ada Lovelace architecture. The RTX 40-series focused on improving ray tracing with Deep Learning Super Sampling (DLSS) version 3, and the RTX 4090 delivered impressive performance gains over the previous RTX 3090 GPU.

The launch of the RTX 50-series GPUs is expected to have significant implications for the gaming and graphics industries, as well as for AI and machine learning applications. With its focus on AI-enhanced graphics and improved performance, Nvidia is poised to maintain its position as a leader in the GPU market.

As the tech industry continues to evolve, the RTX 50-series GPUs represent a significant milestone in the development of AI-powered graphics and computing. With its innovative design and features, Nvidia is setting a new standard for the industry, and it will be interesting to see how competitors respond to this challenge.