The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650 Review, Feat. Zotac: Fighting Brute Force With Power Efficiency
by Ryan Smith & Nate Oh on May 3, 2019 10:15 AM ESTThe Test
While the GeForce GTX 1650 is rolling out as a fully custom launch, the nature of the entry-level segment means that boards will be very similar across the board. For one, going beyond 75W TDP would require an external PCIe power connector. So the 75W ZOTAC GeForce GTX 1650 with boost clocks dialed 30MHz down to reference is a good approximation for a generic reference GTX 1650, allowing us to keep testing and analysis as apples-to-apples as possible. While not perfect, this should be reasonably accurate for a virtual reference card as we look at reference-to-reference comparisons.
Overall, as this primarily covers cards in the low- to mid-range, all game benchmarking is done at 1080p, looking at performance on our standard 1080p Ultra settings, as well as high and medium options that are better suited for these sorts of sub-$150 cards.
| Test Setup | |||||
| CPU | Intel Core i7-7820X @ 4.3GHz | ||||
| Motherboard | Gigabyte X299 AORUS Gaming 7 (F9g) | ||||
| PSU | Corsair AX860i | ||||
| Storage | OCZ Toshiba RD400 (1TB) | ||||
| Memory | G.Skill TridentZ DDR4-3200 4 x 8GB (16-18-18-38) |
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| Case | NZXT Phantom 630 Windowed Edition | ||||
| Monitor | LG 27UD68P-B | ||||
| Video Cards | ZOTAC GAMING GeForce GTX 1650 OC NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650 (4GB) AMD Radeon RX 570 8GB AMD Radeon RX 570 4GB AMD Radeon RX 460 4GB (14 CU) AMD Radeon RX 370 (2 GB) NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 Ti NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 6GB Founders Edition (1260 cores) NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 3GB (1152 cores) NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 Ti (4GB) NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 2GB NVIDIA GeForce GTX 960 (2GB) NVIDIA GeForce GTX 950 NVIDIA GeForce GTX 750 Ti |
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| Video Drivers | NVIDIA Release 430.39 AMD Radeon Software Adrenalin 2019 Edition 19.4.3 |
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| OS | Windows 10 x64 Pro (1803) Spectre and Meltdown Patched |
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Driver-wise, in addition to not being made available before launch, the 430.39 release was not the smoothest either, with a 430.59 hotfix coming out just this week to resolve bugs and performance issues. In our testing, we did observe some flickering in Ashes.
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onbquo - Friday, May 3, 2019 - link
Why is it nobody talking about coming 7nm Radeons mopping the floor in the 75W segment?PeachNCream - Friday, May 3, 2019 - link
Because no one has been able to benchmark said graphics cards so no one knows if something is going to mop floors or just draw polygons. (Personally, I'm in for a GPU that will mop my floors for me. I'd also like one that will mow the yard, wash the dishes, and take care of the laundry.)onbquo - Friday, May 3, 2019 - link
Good point but I seriously believe the next architecture Radeon built on 7nm could perform almost twice as fast than a RX 560 with 1024 CUs. Am I the only one hyped for 7nm graphics cards?guidryp - Friday, May 3, 2019 - link
You are making a pile of assumptions with no evidence.Process bumps aren't the big win that they once were. Radeon 7 is 7nm and it didn't get twice as fast. RTX2080 outperforms it while using less power.
7nm is NOT a magic bullet. We need to wait and see what actually happens.
Cooe - Friday, May 3, 2019 - link
More recent benchmarking actually shows the RVII with the performance edge vs the RTX 2080 (AMD just completely botched the launch drivers-wise, as isn't particularly uncommon for them) as many recent videos have shown, but you're totally passing over the fact that it uses the exact same Vega architecture as 14nm Vega 10 but manages to outperform it by around 30% while pulling LESS power than a V64. That's nearly a 40-50% boost in power efficiency per fps, with absolutely no arch changes beyond 2x additional memory controllers. Even if Navi only matches that kind of efficiency bump vs Polaris it'll still be looking really good just as long as they maintain their performance advantage as well.guidryp - Saturday, May 4, 2019 - link
Better in one or two AMD favorable games, but not overall. Beating power of V64 is needed, but still doesn't come close to NVidia power usage.Oxford Guy - Saturday, May 4, 2019 - link
7nm TSMC isn't nearly as impressive as 5nm TSMC. 80% increase in density with 5nm. 7nm is a little bit sad, really. But, it saves companies money because it doesn't require nearly as much design rules modification, so porting existing 14nm stuff is much easier.PeachNCream - Tuesday, May 7, 2019 - link
I'm really looking forward to seeing what 7nm GPUs do once they hit the market, but I want to hold back on making judgements before we see what sorts of performance and power numbers emerge. I'm also more interested in mobile than desktop components because I have not put together or purchased a desktop PC in the past 5 years since I find laptops and phones a better fit in my living space and lifestyle.nevcairiel - Saturday, May 4, 2019 - link
Personally, the only reason I would ever care about a 75W card is for video duties - and AMDs video decoding/encoding is significantly worse then Intels or NVIDIAs. So there is that.I would be excited if they were trying to make a high-end 7nm card that doesn't suck, but apparently its once again just low-power cards. same old same old. I'm bored already.
Oxford Guy - Saturday, May 4, 2019 - link
"Personally, the only reason I would ever care about a 75W card is for video duties "Then the lack of B frame support in the encoder is a deal-breaker.