It’s a bizarre, tough time to assessment GPUs. The PC graphics market has been in overdrive for the final couple of years for a number of causes. For one, individuals have been locked down, caught indoors with disposable revenue unused – so the place higher to spend it than on a PC improve? However then there’s the silly facet of issues – all this crypto mining BS – plus the impacts of the pandemic on the availability chain and manufacturing. As such, nothing concerning the graphics card market is dependable.
So sitting right here, tasked with reviewing the most affordable RTX card from Nvidia to this point, I’m confronted with tough selections. A significant factor in GPU evaluation is the price-to-performance ratio, however what are you able to do when shopping for these playing cards at RRP is nigh inconceivable? The reply, actually, is boring: we simply need to warn you that the conclusions drawn on this assessment are based mostly on the RRP, and also you may end up extra disillusioned when you shell out additional to get one quick.
The Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050 punches in at £239 / $249, although you possibly can sadly count on to pay slightly additional within the present market. This isn’t technically all-new silicon, because the 3050 made its debut in laptops final yr – however now it’s launching in a desktop format, which has been tweaked and upgraded from what was accessible on cell appropriately.
Let’s simply lay out the place this card stands. On the high finish, Nvidia has playing cards just like the RTX 3080 and 3080 Ti, show-stopping beasts that include a four-figure price ticket to match. Prior to now, the entry level of the market was the RTX 3060, which we demonstrated with Minecraft and described as ‘1080p playing cards with a 1440p upside’, the place maybe the primary cause you have been shopping for the cardboard was to get these RT cores which allow options like ray tracing and DLSS. Nvidia has gingerly positioned the 3050 a small clip beneath that card; lopping $80 off the worth in trade for taking away a lot of that 1440p upside.
That’s a 25% discount in worth in comparison with the 3060, then, and it’s truthful to say that roughly every thing concerning the card tracks in that type of zone. From energy consumption to variety of cores, bandwidth, and in the end efficiency, this card is round 1 / 4 to a 3rd much less highly effective than the 3060. So the worth strains up – and that, a minimum of, is nice.
Should you’re not rocking a 4K show, a lot as with the 3060, this new card can supply vital advantages with out breaking the financial institution. A sport like Murderer’s Creed Valhalla can run on medium settings at 1080p and get a near-sold 60fps with out challenge. The identical is true for Cyberpunk 2077. Different much less taxing or higher optimized video games can do even higher; so it is a card that may ship even higher, pushing out nicely in extra of 60fps in comparatively latest video games like Hitman three or Resident Evil Village.
If you wish to push issues to 1440p, you’ll get respectable efficiency, and positively be capable of handle a locked thirty even in tougher trendy video games round medium settings – however I do suppose that is most at house as a 1080p card.
It’s great things, although a lot of this efficiency is just like what you’d get out of a a lot older card comparable to a GTX 1660 Tremendous. What you come to this card for, then, is that RTX designation – and the added goodies you get because of this.
To that finish, let’s come again to Cyberpunk, a sport that’s considerably reworked by the ray tracing presentation. Should you flip on ray tracing for each reflections and shadows, the RTX 3050 primarily presents the sport at 1080p medium with its body charge halved, right down to proper round 30fps. It ought to be capable of handle a comparatively locked 30. Activate DLSS, nonetheless, and you’ll take pleasure in the identical high quality picture (roughly) with a body charge that’s within the fifties – although sadly not fairly 60fps.
DLSS, which super-samples the sport picture and makes use of AI to upscale it to keep away from any artifacting, is essential to creating ray tracing viable on a card comparable to this. It might additionally simply straight-up be used to spice up efficiency – so if fancy lighting doesn’t hassle you, knock ray tracing off and DLSS on to see Cyberpunk publish near the 100fps mark. Which, on a $250 card, actually ain’t dangerous.
In comparison with a card just like the GTX 1660 Tremendous, one of many older era playing cards this goals to be a viable improve to, the query subsequently turns into easy: would you like options like DLSS and ray tracing? Should you do, and extra video games are consistently including help for them, then you definitely want these RTX cores – and that is now the most affordable choice to get them. Nevertheless, this card additionally doesn’t really feel as a lot an improve as a few of its 30 collection siblings. The upper-end playing cards supplied eye-popping will increase on the 20 collection, the earlier era – however the RTX 3050 struggles to outpace the RTX 2060 in lots of, many eventualities. That’s a little bit of a bummer.
One place the place Nvidia doesn’t wrestle a lot with this card is within the battle with AMD. They’ll be happy with the outcomes there. AMD’s closest choice to that is the RX 6500 XT, which is a less expensive card but in addition posts some really woeful efficiency; GamersNexus has an incredible breakdown of the way it even loses to GPUs launched way back to six years in the past. That card is a humiliation even at its RRP; Nvidia’s providing has efficiency that feels fairly according to its pricing.
And so all of it turns into a query of worth. The RTX 3050 is supposed to price $250, however with the market dictating it’ll doubtless be promoting for probably as a lot as double that, how worthwhile it’s it? Properly, even a second-hand GTX 1660 Tremendous, the cardboard we beforehand referenced as a comparability level, is often going for $500 proper now. And according to that, even $500 for this type of strains up as acceptable – it’s the identical worth as an open-box last-gen card, however you get these RTX cores. Should you get extraordinarily fortunate and discover one in inventory, non-scalped, at RRP, it’s a contextual steal.
However, wow, doesn’t this complete factor present how deeply damaged the GPU market is correct now? We’re speaking about how $500 won’t be a nasty deal, market context thought-about, for an entry degree card. It’s tousled. This may’t be mounted quickly sufficient – and when it’s, the 3050 will current as an absolute steal at $250. For now, we are able to suggest it – however by way of gritted enamel, thanks to those silly market situations.