Best Mainstream$(100 - $200)
if you’re
after power efficiency, the best value-oriented GPU is the GeForce GTX 1650 Super which comes at around $160. If you
care less about efficiency and want the most bang for your buck, then you
should also consider the good old Radeon RX 580 which has a more ample 8GB memory
buffer. Generally speaking, you can snag either for as little as $160 depending on your brand of choice,
which is a great deal. You may also want to fish for RX 590 cards that are
about $200 and offer a little boost over these two otherwise great options.
Other
options in this price range include the Radeon RX 5500 XT for $200 if you want an 8GB VRAM
buffer, or $180 for a measly 4GB. The 5500 XT is a gimped GPU in our opinion
because of its PCIe 4.0 x8 bandwidth limitation. Not only does that make the
PCIe 4.0 support completely worthless, but it means the card is potentially
handycapped when installed in a system that only featured PCIe 3.0 support,
which right now is the vast majority.
Lastly,
there's the more affordable Radeon RX 570. The 8GB version of the RX 570 isn’t
great in terms of value, but if you want a cheap and still very capable
graphics card, the 4GB RX 570 are a steal at just $120. For a little extra cash, this little GPU is much
faster for gaming than the sub-$100 alternatives you can find around and that
we decided to skip entirely for this buying guide.
Best
Mid-Range GPU ($200 - $350)
GeForce GTX
1660 Super vs. GeForce RTX 2060 vs. Radeon RX 5600 XT
Gamers
looking to spend around $300 have a few options to consider, but overall
we like the GeForce GTX 1660 Super a lot if you want to spend less in
this range. For about $230, the GeForce GTX 1660 Super offers amazing value,
beats the competition at this price point and is an efficient little card.
The
GTX 1660 Super is on average a tad faster than the Radeon RX 590, beating it
overall by a 13% margin, even though the Radeon has more VRAM. Compared to
power hungry Vega 56, the GTX 1660 Super is ~15% slower but it also costs less. Crucially, it's widely available, it's worlds
better in terms of power usage, and offers a little extra OC headroom.
Closer
to the $300 mark and slightly above it, the Radeon RX 5600 XT is a respectable product that has
pushed for lower prices and better performance at $300. For that alone, we
commend it. The GPU won’t blow your socks off and yet it's better value than
the Radeon RX 5700 which we liked a lot on that aspect already.
On
the opposing side, the GeForce RTX 2060 has a few models selling for around $320
and above. Between those two, the 5600 XT is a little cheaper, offers about the
same performance and is a little more efficient. Recently we discouraged you
from picking Navi-based Radeons due to AMD's spotty driver support, but it
seems the company has been working hard and those nags are mostly over.
For
a pure value play, we can recommend the Radeon RX 5600 XT that starts at $279. Make sure it corresponds to the games you play
the most in our 32 game benchmark where AMD or Nvidia are favored by
certain titles. Then for slightly more money, we still like the GeForce RTX 2060 better as an overall
package and some potential for ray tracing and DLSS support which has meant
little so far, but there's potential for more in the coming year
Best High-End 1440p GPU ($400 and above)
Radeon 5700 XT vs. Radeon 5700 vs. RTX 2070 Super vs. RTX 2060
Potential
driver issues aside, the mid-range market is locked down by AMD with the Radeon RX 5700 and 5700 XT in
terms of bang for your buck. After a series of massive game benchmarks
featuring the 5700, 5700 XT, RTX 2060 Super and RTX 2070 Super, we have a good
idea of how these GPUs compare. In a nutshell, the Radeon 5700 XT is $100
cheaper than the RTX 2070 Super and when compared across
a massive range of games it's only 6% slower on average at 1440p.
Why
would you go GeForce instead? The RTX 2070 Super is
faster for 4K gaming and we've also witnessed a promising renaissance of DLSS.
Not unlike the previous price segment, the Radeon is the better value
proposition, even at 4K the 5700 XT offers more value: it's 9% slower but costs
20% less.
The
Radeon 5700 XT also eliminates the RTX 2060 Super from contention, offering
more performance at the same price, while the vanilla 5700 offers 2060 Super
performance for a ~$50 discount.
An additional word about the RTX
2070: careful about selecting your brand and model. Non-Super RTX
2070s are still around, but the RTX 2070 Super variant
is the obvious choice. It's faster than the standard 2070 by ~12 percent for
the same price.
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