Can NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 Ti 8GB run RFdiffusion?

200M parameter Scientific Computing model on 8GB GDDR6

Yes — runs at 4-bit quantization
SpeedModerate speed, usable for interactive chat
QualityGood quality with slight degradation on complex reasoning

VRAM Requirements

RFdiffusion is a 200M parameter model. At full precision (FP16), it requires 16GB of VRAM. Your NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 Ti 8GB has 8GB, so you'll need to quantize it to 4-bit (Q4) to fit.

FP16 (Full Precision)16GB (need 8GB more)

Maximum quality, no quantization

Q8 (8-bit)10GB (need 2GB more)

Near-lossless, ~50% size reduction

Q4 (4-bit)8GB (0GB free)

Good quality, ~75% size reduction

Your GPU VRAM: 8GB GDDR6 at 288 GB/s bandwidth
Recommended system RAM: 32GB DDR5 (2x GPU VRAM minimum for model overflow)

What This Means in Practice

RFdiffusion fits on NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 Ti 8GB at reduced precision or with smaller inputs. Adequate for exploration and smaller-scale experiments. For production workloads, consider a GPU with more VRAM.

How to Set It Up

Step 1: Set up Python environment

conda create -n scicomp python=3.10 && conda activate scicomp

A clean Conda environment avoids dependency conflicts. Python 3.10 is recommended for most scientific computing tools.

Step 2: Install RFdiffusion

git clone https://github.com/RosettaCommons/RFdiffusion.git && cd RFdiffusion && pip install -e .

Protein design through diffusion from the Baker Lab. Requires PyTorch with CUDA support.

Step 3: Run protein design

See the RFdiffusion GitHub for examples: unconditional generation, binder design, motif scaffolding, and symmetric assemblies.

Step 4: Verify GPU is being used

nvidia-smi

Check that VRAM usage increases when the model loads. You should see ~8GB used.

NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 Ti 8GB Specs

VRAM8GB GDDR6
Memory Bandwidth288 GB/s
TDP160W
CUDA Cores4,352
Street Price~$370
AI Rating3/10

Other Scientific Computing Models on NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 Ti 8GB

About RFdiffusion

Protein design through diffusion — generate novel protein structures, design binders for therapeutic targets, and scaffold functional motifs. From the Baker Lab at UW. VRAM usage depends on protein size; most designs fit on 8-10GB but complex multi-chain assemblies need 16GB+.

Category: Scientific Computing · Parameters: 200M · CUDA required: Recommended