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Nvidia has upped the performance and value ante with its updated “Super” Turing lineup. We’ve seen this from the high-end cards now down to the budget side with the GTX 1650 Super and GTX 1660 Super. Here we saw the GTX 1650 Super come within striking distance of the GTX 1660, which makes it a worthwhile 1080p / ultra card, with occasional compromises. Since the new 1650 Super is priced at $159.99 versus $200-plus for the 1660 Ti, the value metric shapes up well for the latest Super card.
Power draw does jump up to 100W in the Super (from 75W), but it still compares quite favorably to any similarly performing AMD currently on the market. The new AMD 5500 should improve efficiency over the aging Polaris architecture. But as of this writing the RX 5500 is still vaporware at retail, and AMD’s own specs peg the card at a 150W TDP--still 50% higher than the 1650 Super.
The main drawback of the Zotac 1650 Super -- and 1650 Supers in general -- is the 4GB of VRAM. Today, this allows for a card capable of running many titles using Ultra settings at 1080p, but some titles crave more memory, resulting in a drastic change in performance and smoothness, if a AAA title has to dump data off the card’s speedy memory buffer. That won’t happen often now, but will likely become increasingly common as future games get more demanding on the memory front. So if you’re looking for a card that you won’t feel the need to replace anytime soon, you may want to save up for a pricer GTX 1600 Ti, with its 6GB buffer--which also delivers a bit better performance overall.
Nvidia’s more-aggressive pricing and increased performance with the Super cards has really chipped away at AMD’s ageing value-oriented GPUs. Now Nvidia generally offers the same or better performance at a similar price on the low end, while using much less power. The GTX 1650 Super specifically brings solid 1080p gaming to the sub-$200 price point, which is a positive for everyone. Zotac’s version brings sufficient (though somewhat noisy) cooling, as well as a slight factory overclock on the core. In sort, if you’re a new 1080p gaming card on a tight budget, the GTX 1650 Super is serious contender at $160.
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Joe Shields is a Freelance writer for Tom’s Hardware US. He reviews motherboards.
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Mileta Cekovic It would be interesting to see how Radeon RX 5500 and especially RX 5500 XT fare against RTX 1650 Super and what the prices of them will be.Reply
With RTX 1650 Super @ $160, Nvidia has given AMD a serious task to beat this price/performance level. -
King_V This, I think, has definitely put AMD on notice. A little hard to say for certain, and I wish the RX 570 4GB and RX 580 8GB results were on the charts as well, but, depending on the game, it looks like the 1650 Super is at least equal to the RX 570, and sometimes matches the RX 590.Reply
Given the $160 price point, it seems the RX 570, 580, and 590 are going to have to adjust prices downward.
Further, I'm thinking that AMD is not going to be able to get by with only matching the RX 580's performance with the RX 5500. Or, if they do, they will have to definitely undercut the 1650 Super's price, which will put even further downward pressure on the Polaris cards.
On the other hand, I don't know what to think about the RX 5500 - at one point it was stated to be a 150W card, then it was 110W. What little performance data we have, and it's precious little data, pegs it at around RX 580 performance. I'm hoping this is all a case of AMD holding their cards close to their chest, but, as it stands, that's not overly promising, given what the 1650 Super offers in performance... and AMD should worry.