The serious GAP in GPU price/performance

[kapone32]

This is not for the Used market.

I don't live near a Microcenter, I have to use Amazon, Newegg, Canada Computers, Memory Express and I believe B&H. There is no doubt that the 2080TI currently is the best GPU in terms of performance but the price of entry costs more than a well specced Gaming PC.

The 2080 Super, 2070 Super, 5700XT and 5700 all share the same (in Canada) $479 to $899 range.

The 2060 Super and 5600XT command the sub $400 range and can all be had for under $400 (usually).

The 1650, 5500XT, 1660, RX 580 and 1660 Super command the sub $300 market.

When you get into sub $200 is where the problem exists. The most viable solution in the sub $200 space is the AMD APUs. The 2400G, 3200G and 3400G are all great for what they are but seriously lacking in raw GPU grunt vs a discrete card (GT 1030 even). It is my opinion that AMD/Nvidia are missing out on a potential market by snubbing the budget market. Indeed (I know I will get at least one Xfire is dead) if AMD released a cut down Vega card with say 16+ Compute units, that was DX12 and Xfire compatible with the GPU in the current AM4 APUs. If that sold for let's say $139.99 (Cad) or $109.99 US an an MSRP and was totally capable of 1080P 60-100 FPS I have no doubt it would be a success especially in these times with depressed economic markets.

I know that there are new GPUS coming out later this year. That does not mean that the current offerings (In Canada) will magically fall into lower tiers, indeed we will likely see the $479 to $1999 get more variety than the $99 to $399 market.

 

[Kanan]

Soonish they will release new APUs called Ryzen 4000 probably, those will possibly be a lot better than the current ones. Also i need a source for your "GT 1030" being better than the current APUs.

There is stuff from both companies in sub 200 range, there's not much of a point in releasing (good) sub 100 GPUs, because GPUs are relatively expensive to make (the whole graphics card) - the margins are way too slim then.

Then again, you can try to buy a new GPU for a small price off of ebay or similar - don't has to be used, not everything is used there.

 

[EarthDog]

Well.........

You can find a GTX 1650 for $160 and a 5500 XT for $180 (US).

I believe the AMD's APUs do a good job below this threshold while Intel iGPUs leave something to be desired on that front. I don't find the gap that big and making cards that can't play 1080p games today seems like a waste (and where APUs come in already). Those GPUs barely run 60 fps @ ultra 1080p...

And yes, multi-GPU is dead, especially for enthusiasts. Non enthusiasts don't want to mess with mGPU... just not worth 2x the power draw, never 2x scaling for double the price.

 

[kapone32]

Soonish they will release new APUs called Ryzen 4000 probably, those will possibly be a lot better than the current ones. Also i need a source for your "GT 1030" being better than the current APUs.

There is stuff from both companies in sub 200 range, there's not much of a point in releasing (good) sub 100 GPUs, because GPUs are relatively expensive to make (the whole graphics card) - the margins are way too slim then.

Then again, you can try to buy a new GPU for a small price off of ebay or similar - don't has to be used, not everything is used there.

The 4000 series should be good but it will still waste a x16 slot on a board.

I should have said the DDR5 1030. I looked at the specs for the 1030 (Nvidia) and the specs for the APUs.

While Ebay does have retailers on it's site. I have read too many horror stories of the card being different than what's on the box that I shy away. Actually most of the used stuff I have bought recently has been from TPU.

I am not saying I am an expert but do motherboards cost more to manufacture than a GPU?

I must also reiterate that it is Canada I am talking about. The US and Europe (for the most part) enjoy better prices than us canucks for PC goodness.

 

[Kanan]

The 4000 series should be good but it will still waste a x16 slot on a board.

APUs do not use PCI-E slots, they (GPUs) are built into the APU or CPU and use the outputs of the mainboard, if the mainboard provides those.

 

[EarthDog]

The 4000 series should be good but it will still waste a x16 slot on a board.

I should have said the DDR5 1030. I looked at the specs for the 1030 (Nvidia) and the specs for the APUs.

While Ebay does have retailers on it's site. I have read too many horror stories of the card being different than what's on the box that I shy away. Actually most of the used stuff I have bought recently has been from TPU.

I am not saying I am an expert but do motherboards cost more to manufacture than a GPU?

I must also reiterate that it is Canada I am talking about. The US and Europe (for the most part) enjoy better prices than us canucks for PC goodness.

1. It does???
2. Sorry canuckistan pricing is like that. It seems more your taxes and canuckstani money against the dollar skews things for you.

EDIT: That said, the performance gaps seem about right between AMD iGPU and budget discrete...pricing is per country.

 

[kapone32]

1. It does???
2. Sorry canuckistan pricing is like that. It seems more your taxes and canuckstani money against the dollar skews things for you.

EDIT: That said, the performance gaps seem about right between AMD iGPU and budget discrete...pricing is per country.
[/QUOTE]

1. You could always put in a discrete card but then you lose the IGPU. The only thing I see right now is IGPU or DGPU what is wrong with IGPU and DGPU working together? They could even make the memory DDR4 and have it totally compatible with system memory. They still make Vega dies (for laptops at that).

2. Taxes and shipping are killers indeed. I miss Tiger Direct and NCIX. Amazon Prime is free (normally) but Amazon.ca offers a percentage (at a premium) of what Amazon.com offers in the space.

 

[Kanan]

1. You could always put in a discrete card but then you lose the IGPU. The only thing I see right now is IGPU or DGPU what is wrong with IGPU and DGPU working together? They could even make the memory DDR4 and have it totally compatible with system memory. They still make Vega dies (for laptops at that).

There was a time for that. Even the first APUs could do this hybrid Crossfire called thing, but Crossfire is dead now - and I'm somewhat glad it is. It was a big hassle anyway. This hybrid Crossfire wasn't great by any means, essentially it involved using the IGPU and combining it with a low end DGPU, to get slightly better performance, but with the usual problems that Crossfire "provides" then.

 

[kapone32]

APUs do not use PCI-E slots, they (GPUs) are built into the APU or CPU and use the outputs of the mainboard, if the mainboard provides those.

There was a time for that. Even the first APUs could do this hybrid Crossfire called thing, but Crossfire is dead now - and I'm somewhat glad it is. It was a big hassle anyway. This hybrid Crossfire wasn't great by any means, essentially it involved using the IGPU and combining it with a low end DGPU, to get slightly better performance, but with the usual problems that Crossfire "provides" then.

I have been running SLI/crossfire since the GTS 450 days. Right now I just finished a retro build using what you describe. Maybe crossfire is dead for AAA FPS games but Total War Hammer 1&2 fully supports Multi GPU and there was some DLC released just this weekend. The thing for me is I don't see the hassle you are describing. The only time I have had any issues with Crossfire is a couple of Driver updates in the last 10 years. I totally enjoy my Vega 64 crossfire setup too. My next build will be 2 5500XTs in DX12 multi GPU goodness on a B550 board.

 

[Vayra86]

I think you're looking at the gap both Intel and AMD are looking to fill with their APUs. So why create discrete for it, after all, its cannibalizing your own product and market.

Discrete has no advantage over CPU integrated when the performance can be had in the one chip. Its just that performance in the one chip is stalling a bit, its a chicken egg thing. AMD tried it with the A10 way back. Wasn't a success because CPU bit was lacking... or because there simply wasn't a market or knowledge of it?

Even today the APUs / IGPs only take flight because they were stuck in every system for years. Yet the product remains and gets refined.

The gap is explained by this; nobody needs a discrete GPU that is just a hair faster than what APUs can do; and if you do, you only need it to output video, in different formats/resolutions/etc.

For Nvidia, the whole segment is super uninteresting except for the 'video output' card thing. They have an excellent (pricy) product for that purpose every time. Above that, you're quickly looking at x50's.

 

[Kanan]

I have been running SLI/crossfire since the GTS 450 days. Right now I just finished a retro build using what you describe. Maybe crossfire is dead for AAA FPS games but Total War Hammer 1&2 fully supports Multi GPU and there was some DLC released just this weekend. The thing for me is I don't see the hassle you are describing. The only time I have had any issues with Crossfire is a couple of Driver updates in the last 10 years. I totally enjoy my Vega 64 crossfire setup too. My next build will be 2 5500XTs in DX12 multi GPU goodness on a B550 board.

The hassle I'm describing is selective, indeed. First of all, when I say CF is dead, it regards the current situation, not old(er) GPUs and old games which support it. Secondly, if the user is of good knowledge and has patience, it is not a problem, especially if he only plays AAA or comparable games. I had Crossfire with the HD 5970 for about a year and it worked 90-95% nicely. A few ARPGs did not support it and that was it, AFAIK. I played mostly AAA/AA games anyway.

 

[EarthDog]

That's all you, OP. Again, most would prefer to spend a bit more for a single card with less potential hassles. People are turned off by the ROI. 2x the price and 2x the power for 0-90% returns (with an average of around 60%). People don't want to have to deal with heat mitigation, additional noise, and significantly more power use.

If it was viable and more people used it (talking iGPU + dGPU combined), I'd imagine we would have seen that technology continue to progress on the desktop. Instead, it petered out several years ago. I've been on HEDT for a daily driver for several years so I have never tried to use it for a decade or so.

 

[Vayra86]

That's all you. Again, most would prefer to spend a bit more for a single card with less potential hassles. People are turned off by the ROI. 2x the price and 2x the power for 0-90% returns (with an average of around 60%). People don't want to have to deal with heat mitigation, additional noise, and significantly more power use.

If it was viable and more people used it (talking iGPU + dGPU combined), I'd imagine we would have seen that technology continue to progress on the desktop. Instead, it petered out several years ago. I've been on HEDT for a daily driver for several years so I have never tried to use it for a decade or so.

Not to mention it is excessively wasteful in many ways, especially with fabs being overloaded with work and strong increase of demand. You also need twice the logistics, twice the stock, etc etc.

There were no real winners with SLI/Crossfire to be fair, and in hindsight. Unless you call that one-time 10-15% reduction in purchase cost (2 cards cheaper than 1 single of equal perf) a true advantage.. it only shines if you never use the cards to actually game; you'll pay it right back in your power bill.

The only sensible argument remaining is absolute performance can be higher with multiple cards... but single card is powerful enough now. You can game anywhere from 720p/ultra to 4K/ultra within one generation's product stack. That wasn't always the case, and is often overlooked in this discussion.

 

[Kanan]

The HD 5970, if I might add, was a premium CF solution - normal Crossfire, for lack of a better wording, is less nice. This answer is based on what the other two guys here provided.

 

[londiste]

When you get into sub $200 is where the problem exists. The most viable solution in the sub $200 space is the AMD APUs. The 2400G, 3200G and 3400G are all great for what they are but seriously lacking in raw GPU grunt vs a discrete card (GT 1030 even). It is my opinion that AMD/Nvidia are missing out on a potential market by snubbing the budget market. Indeed (I know I will get at least one Xfire is dead) if AMD released a cut down Vega card with say 16+ Compute units, that was DX12 and Xfire compatible with the GPU in the current AM4 APUs. If that sold for let's say $139.99 (Cad) or $109.99 US an an MSRP and was totally capable of 1080P 60-100 FPS I have no doubt it would be a success especially in these times with depressed economic markets.

GTX1650 is a 140$€£ card, RX5500 is a 170$€£ card. At least in EU as well as US there are models available at these price points. GTX1650 is around that 16CU target you are referring to (technically less than that) and 5500XT is a 22CU card. Lower models for the most part - especially for gaming - are increasingly driven out by APUs as you and others already said. There really is no larger gap there in terms of price.

Xfire (or SLI) never did exist as the budget option. I would even argue not a viable mainstream option. For enthusiasts it made sense in limited scenarios and always with considerable tweaking and/or downsides. mGPU just is not a thing and there does not seem to be a viable method in sight to make it a thing.

 

[Kanan]

Good times! Hope is not too much OT. This is for the pleasure of the OP.

I scored P7 586 in 3DMark 11 Performance

AMD Phenom II X4 940, ATI Radeon HD 5970 x 3, 8192 MB, 64-bit Windows 8.1}

www.3dmark.com

I scored P6 684 in 3DMark 11 Performance

AMD Phenom II X4 940, ATI Radeon HD 5970 x 2, 8192 MB, 64-bit Windows 8.1}

www.3dmark.com

GTX1650 is a 140$€£ card, RX5500 is a 170$€£ card. At least in EU as well as US there are models available at these price points. GTX1650 is around that 16CU target you are referring to (technically less than that) and 5500XT is a 22CU card. Lower models for the most part - especially for gaming - are increasingly driven out by APUs as you and others already said. There really is no larger gap there in terms of price.

Xfire (or SLI) never did exist as the budget option. I would even argue not a viable mainstream option. For enthusiasts it made sense in limited scenarios and always with considerable tweaking and/or downsides. mGPU just is not a thing and there does not seem to be a viable method in sight to make it a thing.

As I see it, 3DFX had it really going, but this solution was different, and inherently working anyway. It was not dependant on games, solely the driver to work.

Other than that, I repeat, premium CF cards, which united 2 GPUs on 1 board, were nice, they were often optimized to work well - not all of them, although.

 

[kapone32]

That's all you, OP. Again, most would prefer to spend a bit more for a single card with less potential hassles. People are turned off by the ROI. 2x the price and 2x the power for 0-90% returns (with an average of around 60%). People don't want to have to deal with heat mitigation, additional noise, and significantly more power use.

If it was viable and more people used it (talking iGPU + dGPU combined), I'd imagine we would have seen that technology continue to progress on the desktop. Instead, it petered out several years ago. I've been on HEDT for a daily driver for several years so I have never tried to use it for a decade or so.

No 2 enthusiasts will see everything the same. They way MBs are built these days do constitute the notion that a single card would be good enough for most people. I was looking at 2 specifics. A card that fills the ultra budget space for $109 US. The other specific is someone who has an APU already (2200-3400G), may not be able to afford a $200 card and having that same card being able to communicate with the card on the APU. I know that using 2 discrete cards have fallen into the realm if niche but that is not the scenario I am describing.

 

[Kanan]

No 2 enthusiasts will see everything the same. They way MBs are built these days do constitute the notion that a single card would be good enough for most people. I was looking at 2 specifics. A card that fills the ultra budget space for $109 US. The other specific is someone who has an APU already (2200-3400G), may not be able to afford a $200 card and having that same card being able to communicate with the card on the APU. I know that using 2 discrete cards have fallen into the realm if niche but that is not the scenario I am describing.

It was <100 at the beginning of Hybrid CF. Now it would be, in a world of theory, 100-200. Low end GPUs prices increased, because APUs made them irrelevant, as already well described by other guys. Technically, new "low end", is not the lowest end anymore, the lowest end is not a thing anymore, not for current AMD gen or current Nvidia gen, at least.

 

[the54thvoid]

@kapone32
Can't you go on a cross-border two-day vacation? (after Coronavirus restrictions are lifted)

Canadian import duty exemptions...

Absence of more than 48 hours

• You can claim goods worth up to CAN$800.
• You may include alcoholic beverages and tobacco products, within the prescribed limits. Refer to sections Tobacco Products and Alcoholic Beverages.
• Goods must be in your possession and reported at time of entry to Canada.
• If the value of the goods you are bringing back exceeds CAN$800, duties and taxes are applicable only on amount of the imported goods that exceeds CAN$800.
• A minimum absence of 48 hours from Canada is required. For example, if you left at 19:00 on Friday the 15th, you may return no earlier than 19:00 on Sunday the 17th to claim the exemption.

So, if you can visit a US store and the card is less than the travel costs....

 

[kapone32]

@kapone32
Can't you go on a cross-border two-day vacation? (after Coronavirus restrictions are lifted)

Canadian import duty exemptions...



So, if you can visit a US store and the card is less than the travel costs....

The problem with that is the closest Micro Center is about a 7 hour drive away. It would be hard for me to convince my wife to go to Detroit for a 2 day Vacation or closer Pittsburgh.

 

[Caring1]

The problem with that is the closest Micro Center is about a 7 hour drive away. It would be hard for me to convince my wife to go to Detroit for a 2 day Vacation or closer Pittsburgh.

Leave her at home and say you are giving her a 2 day break.

 

[tussinman]

It is my opinion that AMD/Nvidia are missing out on a potential market by snubbing the budget market

I agree with you. This generation has been absolutely pathetic for entry level cards (funny considering sub $150 use to be the king of value)

A nearly 7 year old 7870XT tahiti (which was only $135 Fall of 2013) is faster than almost every single entry level card of this gen (GT 1030, GTX 1050 non Ti, GTX 750, GTX 950, RX460/560).

That's embarrassing, thats like the equivalent of a 2011 entry level card barely offering 8600 GT/GTS level performance.

2.5 years into last gen you could get near highend launch performance (X1900/7900GT level) and 10-15% faster performance than a 1 year old midtier (8600GTS level) on just an $89 dollar 9500GT.........

Absolutely pathetic from both sides. Literally the only saving grace in the last 2 years is vendors dumping the prices of the old 470/480/570s but even then that's pretty sad that you basically have to wait for a 2016 era card to get closeout price (at the very end of the generation) just to get a good entry level priced card

 

[Hyderz]

well thanks new zealand prices are worse..
$350nzd for a 1650 super to $2399nzd for a Rtx 2080ti

 

[FordGT90Concept]

The 1650, 5500XT, 1660, RX 580 and 1660 Super command the sub $300 market.

These are your 1080p cards (have 5500 XT/had RX 590, speaking from experience). They really shouldn't be in the $200-300 USD range... I mean, R9 390 wasn't that much slower than RX 590 and it was about $300 years ago...flat performance over all those years...but power consumption has dropped drastically too.

Honestly, RX 5500 XT is a $200 or less card.

But this gets to my point...

Your problem is your weakening currency. Welcome to the new, pandemic-induced normal. Imports (which cards are) are going to be more expensive.


CPUs are always going to be cheaper than discreet graphics cards of comparative performance simply because of all the material and manufacturing costs that go into making a card versus a socketed processor. DRAM isn't cheap.

The integrated GPUs (sans the Devil's Canyon oddballs with HBM...which suffer noticeable drop when the HBM is full) always suffer severe bottlenecks because they don't have ridiculously high bandwidth video memory.

 

[johnspack]

Heh, yeah, here's a 2080 ti up here for 2200 dollars: https://www.newegg.ca/evga-geforce-...0 ti&cm_re=2080_ti-_-1FT-001K-003E4-_-Product
I'm going to be running my 980 ti for a loooooooong time.....