We bring to your attention a translation of a Techspot article , the authors of which analyze the video card market and recommend the best of them for purchase. In their opinion, buying a new high-end graphics card may not be a good idea, as these products will replace newer and faster GPUs before the end of the year. However, if you are looking for something in the middle price range, then it will most likely take some time before these cards are updated. It also makes sense to buy if you do not want to wait until acceptable prices for new generation video cards are established. Let’s be honest, prices are almost always inflated at launch, and new product availability can also be very weak during the first few months after launch.
Six games were selected for testing: Red Dead Redemption 2, Rainbow Six Siege, Far Cry 6, Hitman 3, Dying Light 2 (medium settings), Shadow of the Tomb Raider (high quality). We will not consider each game separately, but we will use the average data calculated using the geomean function. This gives us an understanding of the performance of each card in order to determine the “cost per frame”.
We use medium quality settings to show both entry and high quality products in the same table. Modern entry-level cards like the RX 6500 XT are not designed for gaming at high quality settings, so medium quality is the maximum for these cards. And top-tier models usually work great at medium settings, although many will choose to play using the Ultra preset. We also have some 4K data that will be most useful for high-end cards.
All testing was done using a Ryzen 7 5800X3D with DDR4-3600 CL16 memory and Resizable BAR enabled, a feature that perfectly minimizes certain CPU weaknesses, especially when testing at 1080p.
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Best graphics card for 1080p gaming
As we saw back in the spring, the AMD Radeon RX 6600 is the best GPU for gaming at 1080p, with a 7% better cost per frame than the Radeon 6600 XT (which comes in at number two). The 6500 XT comes in third, although given the low performance levels and limited feature set, this card should have offered a better price-per-frame to make up for it. Although the price has dropped to $180 (which is below MSRP), to match the cost of a 6600 frame, it would need to cost no more than $160, as the RX 6400 is now. As we said, the price should be no more than $150 , and best of all – about 100 dollars.
The RTX 3050, which now costs $330 and sits between the RX 6600 and RX 6600 XT, could also be in this battle of entry-level cards. However, the price per frame for the GeForce model is 43% more expensive than the 6600 and 33% more expensive than the 6600 XT, which is not very justified. The RTX 3050 remains a poor investment despite price cuts over the past few months.
Much more appropriate to compare with the $380 RTX 3060. In April, the price per frame of this card was 22% more expensive than the 6600 XT, and now it is only 13%. This makes the RTX 3060 a good buy for 1080p gaming. If you’re not interested in DLSS, which isn’t very efficient at 1080p, the 6600 XT is a better choice.
Best graphics card for 1440p gaming
Playing at 1440p we can compare the top-end models, though it doesn’t change the overall placement of each card much (compared to 1080p). The RX 6600 is still the best GPU in terms of frame cost, but the RX 6700 XT is surprisingly close to it and only 4% more expensive. These two cards are not on the same level, they have a difference in performance, but this data suggests that the 6700 XT is an excellent buy for about $500.
Of course, some may point out the lack of certain features in the 6700 XT, such as the lack of DLSS, weaker support for ray tracing, which falls short of Nvidia’s solutions. The RTX 3060 Ti is only 12% more expensive per frame; it’s slightly slower than the 6700 XT at 1440p, and also costs $30 more. We think many gamers at this price point will want access to Nvidia features, at least until FSR 2.0 can catch up with DLSS.
Thanks to lower prices for Nvidia products, it is now harder to choose in the higher segments of the market. AMD used to rank slightly lower than competing Nvidia models, but that’s no longer the case. The 6800 XT and RTX 3070 have the same cost per frame, while models up to the RTX 3080 are within 15% of the 6800 XT. Depending on how important Nvidia features are to you, it might make sense to choose the RTX 3080 over AMD products.
If you’re looking for an Nvidia card that’s closest to the 6800 XT in terms of rasterization performance, it’s the RTX 3080 Ti, which is now 37% more expensive per frame. We certainly wouldn’t recommend this or any other top-of-the-line model in Nvidia’s current lineup. But given the RTX 3080 12GB and below, we think it makes sense to choose a Green Team representative as Nvidia’s GPUs have become more competitive in recent months.
The best graphics card for 4K gaming
Speaking of 4K gaming, we see Nvidia’s RTX 30 GPUs benefit as their performance scales better at higher resolutions than AMD’s. But the RX 6700 XT is the undisputed leader in frame price, the 3060 Ti is also at the top of the chart, costing 8% more than AMD. That’s more than in spring, but still quite a bit, especially if Nvidia’s feature set is important to you.
At this resolution, high-end cards are most interesting, especially those that average over 90 FPS. The best GPU here is the RX 6800 XT, but as we’ve seen at 1440p, GeForce products are closer to the lead this month than they’ve been in the past.
The RTX 3080 is only 5% more expensive per frame (up from 13% in April), so in such a fight it’s hard to miss Nvidia, which offers additional features. The fight between the RTX 3080 Ti and the RX 6900 XT has also become more dramatic, with GeForce being 19% more expensive per frame before, and that forced buying Radeon cards. And now the “price per frame” is only 11% higher and this complicates the choice.
What hasn’t changed is that Nvidia’s flagship GPUs are horrendously priced. The RTX 3090, and especially the RTX 3090 Ti, are slightly faster than the RTX 3080 Ti but cost 58% more per frame (in the case of the 3090 Ti). While a large VRAM buffer is useful for some workstation applications, it’s very hard to justify the 3090 series for gaming.
Best Graphics Card for 1440p Gaming (Europe)
In Europe, pricing is more favorable to AMD. As in the US, the RX 6600 is the best GPU on the market, but there are four more AMD cards ahead of Nvidia’s first model, including the RX 6800 XT. Therefore, it is difficult to recommend a GeForce GPU. For example, the 6600 is 10% slower than the RTX 3060 but costs 21% less per frame: you save over 100 euros by buying a Radeon. Therefore, the 6600 is in a better position in the mainstream market than in the US, although the RTX 3050 looks better in Europe (but its price is still not very satisfactory).
For mid-rangers, the RX 6700 XT’s position is similar to the US market when compared to the RTX 3060 Ti, but the GeForce costs 12% more than a frame. However, it’s hard to justify spending above €500 on any of these cards, even the RTX 3070. The only exception is the RX 6800 XT: at a frame price of under €5, it’s the undisputed choice for buyers in need of high-quality frame rates. The closest-performing cards from Nvidia start with the RTX 3080, and that model is 28% more expensive, which is hard to justify even considering the difference in features. Even worse with higher tier models like the RTX 3080 Ti; the RTX 3090 Ti is especially ridiculous.
conclusions
In summary, there are two groups of GPUs on the market that should be avoided if cost matters: The RX 6500 XT isn’t the worst card in terms of frame cost, but it lacks important features, limited PCIe bandwidth, and a small VRAM buffer.
And the RTX 3090 and RTX 3090 Ti should be avoided for another reason. Now they offer the worst value on the market for gamers and by the end of 2022 they will be swept away by a new generation of GPUs.
As for the cards that can be considered for purchase, this will depend not only on the indicators (see diagrams), but also on your region. There are a few cases where Nvidia has narrowed the frame cost gap compared to AMD cards, but still remains about 10% more expensive in this metric. If you’re interested in DLSS and ray tracing it’s more than worth it, but if you’re not, then AMD cards tend to have the best cost/performance ratio.
