When it comes to graphics cards, everyone's focus will often be on the 3060Ti, 3070 and even 3080 and other high-end graphics cards, but the high-end graphics cards are only part of the graphics card market, and the real best-selling is actually low-end and entry-level graphics cards, whether it is the OEM market or the low-end DIY market has a huge demand.
Although in the eyes of hardcore players and some netizens, entry-level graphics cards are garbage, it is often "better to add money" and "it is recommended to buy PS5" and other words. But for players who only want to play LOL, CS: GO (entertainment), play online games such as Sword Net Three and Warcraft, spending a lot of money on high-end graphics cards not only spends additional budgets, but also most of the time the graphics card occupies less than 20%, and the fan does not even spin, which is completely overkill.
Therefore, low-end and entry-level game graphics cards have become a good choice, on the one hand, they can save budget, on the other hand, the price reduction of entry-level graphics cards is often lower than that of high-end graphics cards, and the depreciation fee for subsequent updates of graphics cards is also lower.
However, entry-level game graphics do not mean that you can buy casually, AMD, Nvidia and other traditional graphics manufacturers have recently launched new entry-level graphics, and there are new players in the discrete graphics market Intel to join in the fun, how to find the most suitable graphics card in these similar price graphics cards is also a problem.
What are the entry-level graphics cards?
Some time ago, AMD launched a new entry-level graphics card RX 6400, with parameters of 768 stream processor, 64bit memory width, and 4G GDDR6 memory. Because the parameters are not good, and coincide with the high price period of the graphics card, the price of nearly 2000 yuan makes many users scorn this graphics card, and compare it with the RTX 3050, which was also priced at about 2000 yuan at the time (the actual price is close to 3000 yuan), thinking that this is "electronic waste" (in terms of performance and price ratio at that time, there is really no problem).
Image source: AMD
But with the overall decline in the price of graphics cards, the RX 6400 has also returned to the normal price, that is, between 1000-1200, while the RTX 3050 continues to maintain a price range of about 2000 yuan. In this way, the price performance of the RX 6400 began to stand out, and the RX 6400 was not originally benchmarked against the RTX 3050, but the possibility of launching a new generation of NVIDIA entry-level game cards.
Because RTX 3050 is the lowest-end graphics card in the RTX series, the positioning of the RTX series itself is mid-to-high-end, so even the RTX 3050 is actually barely a mid-range graphics card, rather than the thousand-dollar entry-level graphics card we often say, and the RTX 3050 is actually the RX 6500 instead of the low-grade RX 6400.
From Nvidia's graphics card update plan, and RX 6400 benchmark should be the GTX 1630 will be launched in June, as an upgraded version of GT 1030, GTX 1630 parameters are 512 stream processor, 4G GDDR6 video memory, video memory bandwidth is also 64bit, from the parameters alone can be judged to be inferior to RX 6400 graphics card.
This year's entry-level graphics contestants are one more than in previous years, that is, Intel's A380, as the first discrete graphics card released by the Intel Sharp series for the consumer market (there have been several products in the ODM market before), the parameters are quite eye-catching, with 8 Xe-Core (the number of undisclosed stream processors, some sources call 1024), equipped with 6GB GDDR6 video memory, and the video memory bandwidth is 96bit.
Image source: Intel
Coincidentally, the A380 is also aimed at the thousand-dollar entry-level game graphics market, and Intel's entry has added a lot of variables to this summer's graphics market, and it has also made it more difficult for users to choose. After all, from the price point of view, the three are almost at the same level, are between 1000-1300 yuan, and in terms of performance, AMD and Intel are leading, but NVIDIA also has the advantage of driving and optimization.
Therefore, the optional entry-level graphics cards are mainly RX 6400, GTX 1650, GTX 1630 and A380, and the transaction price is within 1300 yuan, how should users with limited budgets choose?
Don't buy entry-level graphics cards
From the parameter point of view alone, Intel's A380 is obviously the strongest, stream processor, video memory capacity, video memory bandwidth are better than the other three graphics cards, in the case of the same price, if it is a traditional graphics card manufacturer can almost brainlessly choose Intel. However, as a new discrete graphics manufacturer, Intel's discrete graphics actual performance and driver stability are all things that players are worried about.
Therefore, we also need to look at the measured data.
First look at 3DMARK, as a widely used graphics card test software, although it does not fully represent the actual game experience, but also has a high reference value.
3DMARK tests are generally Fire Strike and Time Spy, which test the performance of DX 11 and DX 12 games at 1080P resolution, respectively, of which DX 11 and below are old games, and DX 12 is corresponding to new games launched in recent years.
The scores in the Fire Strike test are:
RX 6400：11457
GTX 1650：10281
GTX 1630：8078
A380：10999
The scores in the Time Spy test are:
RX 6400：3570
GTX 1650：3424
GTX 1630：2453
A380：4497
Considering the different test platforms, the graphics card scores were selected for comparison, and the total score of the CPU score was not selected, but we can also see the difference between the four graphics cards more obviously. In terms of test scores alone, the A380 leads a lot in the Time Spy test with high requirements for video memory with its strong parameters, and is very close to the GTX 1650 and RX 6400 in the Fire Strike test.
And it can be clearly seen that although the GTX 1630 is NVIDIA's latest entry-level graphics card, the score in the performance test has a significant fault compared with the other three graphics cards, and it is not a level of existence. In the case of such a large performance gap, even if NVIDIA is optimized well, it is unlikely to have any good performance in the actual game, not to mention the GTX 1650 at the same price, so the GTX 1630 is the first to go out in the showdown of the thousand-dollar game graphics card.
To be honest, I don't quite understand the positioning of the GTX 1630, the price of the 1200 or so is almost exactly the same as the current price of the GTX 1650, and the GTX 1650's performance and parameters are completely beyond the former (just look at the model also knows the relationship between the two). Logically, the price of GTX 1630 should be less than a thousand yuan as a bright card to be more reasonable, and the current price is completely unworthy of purchase.
In the game test, based on the 1080 resolution and high image quality, the frame-count performance of the three graphics cards in different games was tested, and the following results were obtained (all of which were average frames):
Tomb Raider Shadow:
RX 6400：51
GTX1650：49
A380：45
Far Cry 6:
RX 6400：45
GTX1650：46
A380：44
Eldon Ring:
RX 6400：40.2
GTX1650：37.1
A380：36.7
CSGO：
RX 6400：301
GTX1650：291
A380：149
Overwatch:
RX 6400：143
GTX1650：92
A380：105
(The above data comes from Super Energy Network)
Of the five games, three are AAA masterpieces and two are popular FPS online games, and the best frame-count performance can be seen in the RX 6400, followed by the GTX 1650, and finally the A380. It turns out that although the parameters are leading, but due to problems such as drive optimization, the A380's performance in the actual game does not meet the parameter performance, and even has a significant gap with the other two graphics cards in CS:GO, but surpasses the GTX 1650 on overwatch.
Judging from the test results, it is basically possible to give a conclusion, in some of the newer games that support DX 12, the gap between A380 and other two graphics cards is not large, the two can be said to be the same level of products, considering Intel's subsequent driver optimization, with the A380 hardware parameters to give a "future promising" evaluation is no problem, the current game experience is also in line with price expectations.
In terms of gaming experience alone, the most worthwhile entry-level graphics cards should be RX 6400 and A380, which not only have better performance, but also support light-chasing mode, while GTX 1650 is not supported. Moreover, the RX 6400 also supports the FSR2 technology released by AMD (similar to Nvidia's DLSS 2.0, but DLSS 2.0 only supports graphics cards above the RTX 30 series), which can sacrifice image quality in exchange for a higher frame rate, so the RX 6400 is currently the most worth buying in the thousand-yuan graphics card.
Image source: AMD
A380 is suitable for users with both gaming and productivity needs, although the game performance is slightly lower than the RX 6400, but the A380 with the compatibility of the Intel platform, so that its performance on H.265, AV1 and other encoders is quite good, can greatly improve the efficiency of video creation. However, it should be reminded that A380 only supports Intel's 10th generation after processors and motherboards, does not support AMD processors, and friends who want to buy need to pay attention.
As for the GTX 1650, I personally don't think it's worth buying at this stage, and if you only accept Nvidia graphics cards, then the GTX 1650 is the only option at this price point (if you don't consider mining cards).