As we all know, NVIDIA released a new desktop graphics card on CES2022 some time ago: RTX 3050.
First of all, this 1899 yuan do not believe, unless you can grab the first wave, otherwise do not think... In the current situation, if the final price of this card on the market is less than 3,000 yuan, Tony directly does not write a manuscript, and feeds the hot pot as a waste.
We have also said before that the main purpose of the sale of the 3050 is to lower the threshold of the RTX 30 series and drive a wave of consumption upgrades. People also specifically pointed out that you are still using gtx series graphics cards!
After Tony tested this graphics card, whether it was successful or not, I don't know, but the threshold of the 30 series was indeed pulled down.
unbelief? Looking further back, we get a Rainbow Tomahawk GeForce RTX 3050 DUO 8G graphics card! Come on, go live!
At a glance, the graphics card is still high enough to recognize the classic tomahawk red and black contrast design. Although it is still very plastic, it is not as "bloated" as it used to look, which slightly raises Tony's first impression.
Unlike the Deluxe Edition of the Triple Fan Edition, this graphics card measures 253.4 × 132.5 × 41mm, contains 4 connectors (1 HDMI, 3 DP), and also becomes a 90mm dual fan design.
Looking at some of the previous discussions on the Internet, there are still a few people who think that the performance of the desktop version of RTX 3050 should be able to catch up with RTX 2060. Tony was particularly puzzled, where did they all come from with confidence?
And from the follow-up tests, it can be seen that its performance and 2060 are still some gaps... Let's talk slowly.
In fact, the card is built with 8nm process and ampere architecture, has 2560 CUDA cores, and is equipped with 128 bit 8GB of GDDR6 video memory.
In terms of graphics card parameters, it itself will be more reasonable as a "consumption upgrade" of gtX1660Ti. Don't look at the CUDA core size of the 1660Ti on the surface, it is not as large as 3050, but this is mainly because people use a Turing architecture.
If there is no concept, it can be simply understood that the number of CUDA cores in the ampere architecture that mainly determines the performance of the graphics card is calculated twice.
If the core number of the RTX 3050 is roughly converted to the Turing architecture, it is about 1280, which is about the same as 1660Ti.
Take a look at the testbed by the way. Tony used the AMD Ryzen 9 3900X processor, which is enough in terms of performance to run with this graphics card.
As usual, to show you the running score, Tony did the performance test under DX 12 and DX 11 respectively.
And the difference between these two scenes, do not understand the difference between friends can be simply understood:
In terms of game frames, DirectX 12 is more optimized than DirectX 11, and DX 11 will have a significant decrease in frame count as the complexity and detail of the picture increases.
And under the same hardware conditions, the former power consumption will be lower.
In the 2K resolution 3DMark Time Spy test, the RTX 3050 graphics card scored 6106 (6166) with a maximum core temperature of 65.84°C.
When Tony tested the game at 4K resolution, its graphics card score reached 2793 (2801) and the core temperature was as high as 65.75°C.
3DMark estimates that the "Battlefield 5" 4K resolution can run 60 frames? I feel like you're teasing me...
Judging from the score in the DX12 environment, it is indeed similar to the GTX 1660Ti, or even slightly inferior... The GTX 1660Ti doesn't perform as well as the RTX 2060.
Don't touch the porcelain people's home 2060, but you can't beat it.
So what about the RTX 3050 in the DX 11 environment? From the results of the test for 1080P resolution, the RTX 3050 ran a score of 15437 points, with a maximum core temperature of 66.19°C.
After moving to the 2K resolution setting test, the RTX 3050 has a graphics card score of 7201 points, while the 4K resolution setting test has become 3308 points.
Swipe left ▼
In the DX12 performance test, the RTX 3050 is not as good as the GTX 1660Ti, but when it comes to the DX11, it can still be played back and forth...
Tony said where this is to lower the threshold, it is clear that he wants to press the "RTX 30" to the ground... From the graphics card ladder chart, it can also be seen that NVIDIA is really choosing words to fill in the blanks this time, see the stitches.
RTX 30 Series: Finished, I'm not high-end?
But the RTX 3050 is also an R-head, so Tony also conducted a 3D Mark light chase test.
It scored 3529 in the Port Royal test.
However, the performance of the RTX 3050 in terms of frame rate is not good, and most of the time it can only be maintained between 13 and 15 FPS, which is not a problem of flowing smoothly, but whether it can be played.
Is it not cool to just look at the running score? But Tony can play games in the office in the name of testing graphics cards, and he can just help everyone see the performance of the game.
And in the process of actually experiencing the game, I suddenly got to where the advantages of the RTX 3050 were. It has DLSS 2.0 technology that can significantly improve game performance while maintaining graphics quality.
Simply put, with this technology, your graphics card learns to "brain patch". For example, you want 4K graphics, but in fact only need to pay the usual rendering of 1080P of power is enough, which is very useful for reducing the burden of graphics cards in high frame rate and high image quality.
With DLSS turned on, the RTX 3050 can maintain a stable frame rate of infinitely close to 60 FPS at the 1080P and 2K maximum image quality of Forever Forever.
However, in 2K quality, if DLSS is turned off, the frame rate of the game will directly drop to about 30 frames, which greatly affects the game experience.
One of the things that annoyed Tony was that not long after I turned off DLSS, I ran into an enemy... The vibrating knife failed miserably.
One thing to say, NVIDIA's DLSS is still stable...
Another game to get started with is Ubisoft's Assassin's Creed: Origins, which starts with a wave of 1080P top quality tests:
The RTX 3050 maintains a stable frame rate of around 60 frames when dynamic, but unlike Forever Bad, the game can only run to around 40 frames at the highest 2K quality.
Compared with the previous two games, Tony believes that the RTX 3050 can easily control the "eternal doom", and it can also get a very good gaming experience in 2K high quality.
However, playing some AAA masterpieces, especially the one that is generally optimized, the 2K maximum image quality is a bit difficult. There's a big difference between being able to play and having fun.
Tony's last tested game was "famous" for bugs: Cyberpunk 2077...
Turning off both ray tracing and DLSS first, the RTX 3050 can only run up to and below 20 frames, which is one-third of the DLSS state turned on.
After Tony pulled the ray tracing performance full and still kept the DLSS unopened state, the performance of the RTX 3050 corresponded almost exactly to the data of the previous run-time, and the entire game could only run 12 frames...
Although it has long been known that its light chasing performance should belong to the kind of "mud can't support the wall", there is still a little disappointment after the actual feeling.
However, in the case of DLSS full, light chase full, and picture quality full, the RTX 3050 can bring players a dynamic 40+ frame performance.
This result is not ideal, but it also achieves the performance of "being able to play".
Got it, just chasing, DLSS!
With games like Cyberpunk 2077 not driving light chase, DLSS dynamics in Super Performance Mode can be infinitely close to 60 frames...
The DLSS Super Performance mode, although it can greatly improve the performance of the game, but also sacrifices some of the visual quality. The world always has to make trade-offs...
All in all, although the RTX 3050 is not very good in terms of running scores, thanks to NVIDIA's "DLSS" technology, the actual experience of the game is not so bad.
Tony personally believes that the overall performance of this card should be between GTX 1660Ti and RTX2060, which is a mid-range top gaming graphics card.
It's big enough for most 1080P and most 2K resolutions.
If this new graphics card can be at the original price of 1899 yuan, or even a little higher to about 2000 yuan, Tony thinks it is a "dessert card" without compromise.
In fact, Nvidia can sink the 30 series to the low-end graphics card market in the current environment, which is actually a good thing for players from the perspective of lao huang.
However, perhaps due to the tide of mines or the hoarding of goods by merchants (Tony prefers the latter), the graphics card premium is still high, and the new 3050 is probably still difficult to flow to players at the original price.
So the question is, if the price of the RTX 3050 rises to the top, will everyone increase the budget to buy 2060 (really expensive, crying)? Or tangled in it and the GTX 1660Ti?
By the heart of the day, if the monitor specifications don't reach 2K, or if you're playing games that don't require high frame rates, Tony prefers the GTX 1660Ti card.
Even DLSS must be at least 2K 60 FPS or more to show real value.
Over the years, compared to the performance improvement, people may prefer to be as close as possible to the original price and buy the products they need.
So NVIDIA can't do it this time and do bad things with good intentions... If the real price is finally speculated to about 3,000 yuan, then the so-called consumption upgrade is not necessary.
Author: Shiyu Editor: Surface Line
Images, sources:
2060 running score data:
https://www.sohu.com/a/289044515_120047380
1660Ti running score data:
https://www.jb51.net/hardware/xianka/660828_all.html
Graphics Ladder Chart: Figure Bar Toolbox