When it comes to graphics cards, everyone’s attention is often focused on mid-to-high-end graphics cards such as 3060Ti, 3070 and even 3080. However, mid-to-high-end graphics cards are only a part of the graphics card market, and the really popular ones are actually low-end and entry-level graphics cards. There is a huge demand in both OEM market and low-end DIY market.
Although in the eyes of hardcore players and some netizens, entry-level graphics cards are rubbish, they are often words such as "it is better to add money" and "I suggest buying PS5". However, for players who just want to play LOL, CS: GO (entertainment) and play online games such as Sword Net III and Warcraft, spending a lot of money on mid-to high-end graphics cards not only costs extra budget, but also takes up less than 20% of the graphics cards most of the time, and the fans don’t even turn, which is totally overqualified.
Therefore, low-end and entry-level game graphics cards have become a good choice. On the one hand, it can save the budget. On the other hand, the price reduction of entry-level graphics cards is often lower than that of mid-to-high-end graphics cards, and the depreciation fee for subsequent updates of graphics cards is also lower.
However, entry-level game graphics cards do not mean that you can buy them at will. Traditional graphics card manufacturers such as AMD and NVIDIA have recently launched new entry-level graphics cards, and there is a new player in the independent graphics card market, Intel. How to find the most suitable graphics card among these graphics cards with similar prices is also a difficult problem.
Some time ago, AMD introduced a new entry-level graphics card RX 6400, with parameters of 768-stream processor, 64-bit memory bit width and 4GDDR 6 memory. Because the parameters are not good, and it coincides with the high price period of the graphics card, the price of nearly 2,000 yuan has made many users sneer at this graphics card, and compared it with the RTX 3050 with the official price of about 2,000 yuan at that time (the actual price is close to 3,000 yuan), thinking that this is "e-waste" (in terms of performance-price ratio at that time, there is nothing wrong with it).
Image source: AMD
However, with the overall decline in the price of graphics cards, RX 6400 also returned to the normal price, that is, between 1000 and 1200, while RTX 3050 continued to maintain the price range of around 2000 yuan. In this way, the performance-to-price ratio of RX 6400 began to stand out, and the original target of RX 6400 was not RTX 3050, but a new generation of entry-level game cards in NVIDIA.
Although RTX 3050 is the lowest-end graphics card in RTX series, the RTX series itself is positioned at the middle and high end, so even RTX 3050 can barely be regarded as a mid-range graphics card, rather than the thousand-yuan entry-level graphics card we often say. The target with RTX 3050 is actually RX 6500 instead of the lower-grade RX 6400.
According to NVIDIA’s graphics card update plan, the target with RX 6400 should be GTX 1630, which will be launched in June. As an upgraded version of GT 1030, the parameters of GTX 1630 are 512-stream processor and 4GDDR6 video memory, and the video memory bandwidth is also 64bit. From the parameters alone, it can be judged that it is a graphics card inferior to RX 6400.
This year, there is one more entry-level graphics card contestant than in previous years, that is, Intel’s A380, as the first discrete graphics card released by Intel Ruixuan series for the consumer market (there have been several products in the ODM market before), which is quite eye-catching in terms of parameters, with 8 XE-Cores (the number of stream processors is not disclosed, but it is reported that there are 1024), equipped with 6GB GDDR6 memory, and the memory bandwidth is 96bit.
Image source: Intel
Coincidentally, A380 is also aimed at the entry-level game graphics card market of 1,000 yuan. The entry of Intel has added many variables to the graphics card market this summer, and it also makes it more difficult for users to choose. After all, from the price point of view, the three are almost at the same level, ranging from 1000 to 1300 yuan, while AMD and Intel are leading in performance, but Invista 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 less than 1,300 yuan. How should users with limited budgets choose?
In terms of parameters alone, Intel’s A380 is obviously the strongest, and its streaming processor, video memory capacity and video memory bandwidth are superior to the other three graphics cards. If the price is the same, traditional graphics card manufacturers can almost choose Intel mindlessly. However, as a new discrete graphics card manufacturer, the actual performance and driver stability of Intel’s discrete graphics cards are all things that players are worried about.
Therefore, we still need to look at the measured data.
First of all, let’s look at 3DMARK, as a widely used graphics card testing software. Although it can’t fully represent the actual game experience, it also has high reference value.
3DMARK’s tests are generally Fire Strike and Time Spy, which respectively test the performance of DX 11 and DX 12 games at 1080P resolution, among which DX 11 and below are mostly old games, while DX 12 is a new game corresponding to the recent years.
The score in the Fire Strike test is:
RX 6400：11457
GTX 1650：10281
GTX 1630：8078
A380：10999
The score in the Time Spy test is:
RX 6400：3570
GTX 1650：3424
GTX 1630：2453
A380：4497
Considering the different test platforms, the scores of graphics cards are selected for comparison, and the total scores of CPU scores are not selected, but we can also clearly see the differences between the four graphics cards. In terms of test scores alone, A380 is ahead in the Time Spy test which requires high video memory, but it is very close to GTX 1650 and RX 6400 in the Fire Strike test.
Moreover, it can be clearly seen that although GTX 1630 is the latest entry-level graphics card in NVIDIA, the score in the performance test is obviously different from the other three graphics cards, and it is not the same level.In the case of such a big performance gap, even if NVIDIA is optimized, it is unlikely that there will be any good performance in the actual game, not to mention the GTX 1650 with the same price, so GTX 1630 is the first to go out in the confrontation of thousand-yuan game graphics cards.
To be honest, I don’t quite understand the positioning of GTX 1630. The price around 1200 is almost the same as the current price of GTX 1650, while the performance and parameters of GTX 1650 completely surpass the former (just look at the model and know the relationship between them). It stands to reason that the price of GTX 1630 should be less than 1,000 yuan to be used as a bright card, and the current price is totally not worth buying.
In the game test, based on 1080 resolution and high image quality, the frame number performance of three graphics cards in different games was tested, and the following results were obtained (all average frames):
Tomb Raider Shadow:
RX 6400：51
GTX1650：49
A380：45
Crysis 6:
RX 6400：45
GTX1650：46
A380：44
Elden ring:
RX 6400：40.2
GTX1650：37.1
A380：36.7
CSGO：
RX 6400：301
GTX1650：291
A380：149
Watch the pioneer:
RX 6400：143
GTX1650：92
A380：105
(The above data is from Chaoneng.)
Among the five games, three are 3A masterpieces and two are popular FPS online games. It can be seen that RX 6400 is the best in frame number, followed by GTX 1650, and finally A380. It has been proved that although the parameters are ahead, due to the problems such as driver optimization, the performance of A380 in the actual game does not conform to the performance of parameters, even in CS: Go, there is a clear gap with the other two graphics cards, but it has surpassed GTX 1650 in the watch pioneer.
From the test results, we can basically draw a conclusion that in some newer games supporting DX 12, the gap between A380 and the other two graphics cards is not big, and they can be said to be products of the same level. Considering Intel’s follow-up driver optimization, it is no problem to give a "future expectation" evaluation based on the hardware parameters of A380, and the current game experience is also in line with the price expectation.
As far as the game experience is concerned, the most worthwhile entry-level graphics cards are RX 6400 and A380, which not only have better performance, but also support the optical pursuit mode, while GTX 1650 does not. Moreover, RX 6400 also supports the FSR2 technology released by AMD (similar to DLSS 2.0 in NVIDIA, but DLSS 2.0 only supports graphics cards above RTX 30 series), which can sacrifice image quality for higher frames, so RX 6400 is the most worth buying among the thousand-yuan graphics cards at present.
Image source: AMD
A380 is suitable for users who need both games and productivity. Although the game performance is slightly lower than RX 6400, A380, with the compatibility of Intel platform, makes it perform quite well in encoders such as H.265 and AV1, which can greatly improve the efficiency of video creation.However, it needs to be reminded that A380 only supports Intel’s processors and motherboards after the 10th generation, and does not support AMD’s processors. Friends who want to buy it need to pay attention.
As for GTX 1650, personally, it is not worth buying at this stage. If you only accept graphics cards from NVIDIA, then GTX 1650 is the only choice at this price (regardless of mining cards).
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