Nvidia Bizarrely Confirms 3050 is Better than Older GPUs Even With Ray Tracing On

Following the announcement of the GeForce RTX 3050 graphics card at CES 2022, it was pretty clear that Nvidia was aiming this as a successor (well, more accurately, replacement) for last-last-gen models such as the 1050, 1050 Ti, 1060, 1660, etc. – A entirely fair bit of marketing considering that those are among some of the most populous GPUs currently owned by gaming consumers. – Following a report via Videocardz, however, an update has been spotted to the 3050’s official website which, quite frankly, makes a bit of a bizarre comparison when pitting the new 3050 against those models.

Nvidia Makes Bizarre 3050 Comparison!

Now, admittedly, in the graph above, I can entirely see what Nvidia was trying to say here. In a nutshell, their new 3050 graphics card is going to offer hugely superior performance to prior entry-level models such as the 1050 or 1650 even when it has its perceivable heavy load ray-tracing capabilities turned on. I think the overall point is that despite the 3050 clearly being the weakest release in the 30XX series, even with all the RTX bells and whistles turned on (the first time Nvidia have offered these on an entry-level focused GPU), it can still easily demolish what the more budget-focused consumer may currently be using.

Let’s be honest though, the graph is more than a bit pointless. The 1050, which Nvidia themselves have used as a comparison, is well over 5 years old now, I’d bloody hope that the 3050 could demolish it in a gaming benchmark even with all the RTX features blazing away!!! – Given that none of the comparative graphics cards used in this test were RTX models though, it’s hardly a comparison at all! – It’s like comparing a supercar featuring a 6L Supercharged engine against a Fiat Panda in a 0-60.

Some Important Information

The one key aspect we have seen in this latest update to the 3050’s website is that Nvidia has confirmed that the price of the graphics card should start at around £239. Considering we’re not expecting Founders Edition models though, consumers can probably expect this to be closer to £300-£350 when custom models from MSI, ASUS, etc. hit the market. Based on what we’ve seen from the AMD Radeon RX 6500 XT, however, Nvidia may not just easily have that beat on performance, but given that we’ve already seen Team Red’s GPU hit closer to $400 with retailers, Nvidia might just have it beat on price too, which, let’s be honest, is probably one of the most challenging aspects of graphics card ownership at the moment (putting availability out of the equation).

When it comes to charts like this though Nvidia, honestly, you didn’t need to bother!

What do you think? – Let us know in the comments!