GeForce GTX 650 Ti Review: Nvidia's Last Graphics Card For 2012

[cleeve]

[citation][nom]Mike-TH[/nom]Why would you not include the GTX 660 Ti in the tests? After all, the 650 Ti and 660 Ti should be the options of the day for upgrades - why not compare them?[/citation]

Because the 660 Ti is over $280 and the 650 Ti is $150. The price difference is too large to be relevant.

 

[sarinaide]

I don't regret leaving my loyalties to team green, this is another abomination that has no place in the market.

 

[luciferano]

[citation][nom]sarinaide[/nom]I don't regret leaving my loyalties to team green, this is another abomination that has no place in the market.[/citation]

I'd think that leaving loyalties to any of the companies is the best solution.

 

[Sakkura]

[citation][nom]Wisecracker[/nom]The HD7850 and GTX 650ti are essentially the same price on New Egg.[/citation]
Well, that's launch pricing for the GTX 650 Ti. They usually drop a bit shortly after launch. Still, it's going to be way too close to the 7850 unless Nvidia really make some big price cuts.

 

[jblank]

I find it curious that the card is tested against an array of other cards.....except the one it's replacing. Seems as though the best example of whether performance has improved is to show its results against its predecessor.

 

[Wisecracker]

Well, that's launch pricing for the GTX 650 Ti. They usually drop a bit shortly after launch. Still, it's going to be way too close to the 7850 unless Nvidia really make some big price cuts.

I suspect AMD will continue to cut prices as long as nVidia wants

As far as AMD and the HD7850 is concerned, it's EOL. They are likely in final production for its replacement.

 

[cleeve]

I find it curious that the card is tested against an array of other cards.....except the one it's replacing. Seems as though the best example of whether performance has improved is to show its results against its predecessor.

At $150, the closest thing the 650 Ti is replacing is the defunct GTX 460, and the new card is powerful enough to be compared to the 560.

The 460 192-bit isn't available anymore, but the GTX 560 SE performs similarly and is at the end of availability. So we tested it to represent both.

If you're talking about the 550 Ti, it's too cheap and slow to be relevant.

 

[jblank]

Ok, but again, the 650TI is replacing the 550TI, a card I happen to own, so it would have been nice for us owners of the previous iteration of their "mainstream" card, to see how it stacks up and whether the 650TI is worthy of an upgrade. I guess I am comparing it to processors. When the Ivy Bridge Core's came out, all the reviews were comparing them to the Sandy's, so ya kinda got to judge the performance and base impressions off of the scores relative to the previous gen. Not a huge deal but certainly curious that the replaced card isn't compared to its replacement.

 

[Dax corrin]

After being an NVidia-only buyer for some time now, AMD's cards are looking better and better. I'm sticking with my GTX 460 1GB a while longer, looking to find another one to SLI.

 

[mousseng]

Ok, but again, the 650TI is replacing the 550TI, a card I happen to own, so it would have been nice for us owners of the previous iteration of their "mainstream" card, to see how it stacks up and whether the 650TI is worthy of an upgrade.

This happens with every benchmark set and review - if you want a direct comparison between the two, you'll currently have to look elsewhere. Otherwise, you'll have to do a bit of comparing: Given that the 550ti < 650 < 650ti, you can use the 650's results to gauge whether or not it'd be a good upgrade.

I think most people here would go ahead and say it's not, though, since the 7850 costs the same (less, in certain cases).

 

[jblank]

Thank you for the reply mousseng. I'm new here and was a bit confused but apparently as you say, I will have to try to take a look at the scores and try to make a call.

The 550TI has been a great card. On my i5 Dell XPS 8300, I can still play Civ V and F1 2012 maxed out at 1080p, so until something I play makes it so that the card cant handle 1080p, I might just keep it.

 

[larkspur]

[citation][nom]jblank[/nom]Ok, but again, the 650TI is replacing the 550TI, a card I happen to own, so it would have been nice for us owners of the previous iteration of their "mainstream" card, to see how it stacks up and whether the 650TI is worthy of an upgrade.[/citation]
Take a look at the chart on the top of the page in the following review: http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/geforce-gtx-660-geforce-gtx-650-benchmark,3297-24.html

Note how the 550ti stacks up against the 650 and the 7770? Now compare it to the chart at the top of the last page of this review we are commenting on. It's not a perfect comparison since different settings were used, but it gives you a good idea so you can use your brain to approximate. In the review I linked, the 550ti is slightly better than the 650 but sits behind the 7770. Remember that performance depends a lot on resolution and settings used but I think it's pretty clear that unless the 650ti comes down in price, a 7850 is a much, much better option.

 

[jblank]

Thanks! At this point I am a bit limited by my PC (Dell XPS 8300) that I still owe about $400 on, so any upgrade has to work around my 460watt power supply, which was what made the 650TI intriguing to me, since I thought it would be more powerful but use less energy than my 550TI does.

 

[renz496]

[citation][nom]Sakkura[/nom]Well, that's launch pricing for the GTX 650 Ti. They usually drop a bit shortly after launch. Still, it's going to be way too close to the 7850 unless Nvidia really make some big price cuts.[/citation]

amd has been doing price cut for a while but true price war still didn't happen. it should be interesting to see if amd able to make a dent to nvidia market share (consumer discrete gpu) by the end of this quarter.

performance wise does it mean this new 650 Ti is faster than my 460 ?

 

[dscudella]

I don't know about Nvidia, this new card just doesn't seem relevant in the market.

Galaxy GTX 650 1gb $107*
Sapphire Vapor-X 7770 $135*
Sapphire 6850 $135*
Gigabyte GTX 650 2gb $140
XFX 6870 $145*
Asus GTX 650 Ti 1gb $155
HiS 7850 1gb $165
Zotac GTX 650 Ti 2gb $170
VisionTek 7850 2gb $185
MSI GTX 660 2gb $230
Galaxy GTX 660 Ti 2gb $280

The price gap seems too large between Nvidia cards. Their's so many better options at that same price range that the 650Ti just doesn't seem appealing in any flavor. I wanted to like it, I really did, but with their bottlenecked memory and poor pricing points, I don't see how anyone could recommended this card.

* denotes price after MIR's

(prices are accurate as of 10am PST 10/9/12 Newegg)

 

[spentshells]

for 128 bit mem interface I find this cards performance impressive ....but this should have been the 650 and this card with a 192bit mem interface for the 650ti.

But instead they put out this thing , shame

 

[ojas]

I, for the first time, didn't find the review useful, or at least wasn't satisfied with it...

1080p isn't even a resolution that this card is meant for.

The problem isn't that the review doesn't compare cards well, it does that. But does it show the cards in the light they're supposed to be in.

IMO, you should have tested on 720p, 1280x1024, 1600x900/1680x1050 @ ultra settings + 4xMSAA.

The qualifiers here would be the ones that maintain 60 fps min at this setting at a particular resolution, and they then should be tested at 1080p with stuff turned all the way up, with and without AA, as an indication of how much performance buffer is available. Or something similar.

Also, i think GPGPU benchmarks were a bit pointless, at least the complete chart, we all know Nvidia's going to get spanked there. Should have just included similarly priced cards.

 

[Dax corrin]

amd has been doing price cut for a while but true price war still didn't happen. it should be interesting to see if amd able to make a dent to nvidia market share (consumer discrete gpu) by the end of this quarter.

performance wise does it mean this new 650 Ti is faster than my 460 ?

Yes, it is faster than your (and my) 460. Still not compelling enough to make me shell out the cash for one, but I'm looking for another 460 1G to SLI, that should keep me and my 1680x1050 monitor going for quite a bit longer. The significant non memory interface crippled NVidia cards are too spendy for me to consider. I'm probably going to go AMD for my next new card purchase. If I can afford the gas to go get it.

 

[nforce4max]

I am staying with my aging collection instead of upgrading. My 460 1gb 256bit that I bought back in the day when they were $225 hasn't let me down yet and my two gtx280 are pulling their weight in another machine just fine.

Screw Nvidia's crappy Kepler for many reasons but look at the 7850 now that is looking very attractive atm.

 

[luciferano]

[citation][nom]renz496[/nom]amd has been doing price cut for a while but true price war still didn't happen. it should be interesting to see if amd able to make a dent to nvidia market share (consumer discrete gpu) by the end of this quarter. performance wise does it mean this new 650 Ti is faster than my 460 ?[/citation]

AMD has already made dents in Nvidia's market share if you compare current AMD and Nvidia market shares to their market shares before Radeon 7xxx launched. I think that AMD has been more or less steadily gaining since the Radeon 4xxx generation, albeit slowly.

 

[ltdementhial]

im currently playing in a HD 5750 with a Phenom II X3 720 @3.2ghz (bad 4º core) and i will make the jump to a Intel I5 3450 (on budget) im currently playing at 1366x768, i can play BF on Ultra settings with blur, ambient occlusion and AA post on but without AF and MSAA at steady 36-40FPS bot online and SP.

But im willing to play with some highest settings at this resolution (for now) like SSAO, 16x AF and 8x AA i was expecting something better with this card becasue im on budget (and mainly i divide my time between work, some Forza on the Xbox and some CSS/ BF3 on the pc) so what would be best? the GTX 560, this or the HD 7770?

 

[luciferano]

[citation][nom]ojas[/nom]I, for the first time, didn't find the review useful, or at least wasn't satisfied with it...1080p isn't even a resolution that this card is meant for.The problem isn't that the review doesn't compare cards well, it does that. But does it show the cards in the light they're supposed to be in.IMO, you should have tested on 720p, 1280x1024, 1600x900/1680x1050 @ ultra settings + 4xMSAA.The qualifiers here would be the ones that maintain 60 fps min at this setting at a particular resolution, and they then should be tested at 1080p with stuff turned all the way up, with and without AA, as an indication of how much performance buffer is available. Or something similar.Also, i think GPGPU benchmarks were a bit pointless, at least the complete chart, we all know Nvidia's going to get spanked there. Should have just included similarly priced cards.[/citation]

Lower resolution with higher MSAA would put this 650 Ti on an even worse playing field than in 1080p with lighter MSAA and a lower resolution with the same level of MSAA and higher details such as Ultra would also probably do the same. Also, a huge amount of people looking at these cards play in 1080p, if not most these days. 1080p is gaining some serious momentum in both high and lower end markets for graphics cards. Basically, I find 1080p to be very relevant here (although I would have liked some lower resolutions tested too) and I doubt that relative performance would change much in lower resolutions with higher details and/or higher MSAA and if it did, it would probably not be in favor of the 650 Ti.

 

[luciferano]

[citation][nom]spentshells[/nom]for 128 bit mem interface I find this cards performance impressive ....but this should have been the 650 and this card with a 192bit mem interface for the 650ti.But instead they put out this thing , shame[/citation]

Yeah, I think that a better 650 Ti than 768 cores and 128 bit memory interface would have been 576 cores with a 192 bit bus. It would have probably been much more balanced and consistent than this 650 Ti.

 

[larkspur]

[citation][nom]ojas[/nom]1080p isn't even a resolution that this card is meant for.[/citation]
I don't totally disagree, seeing how the card performs at 720p would be nice. But since AMD is selling the 7850 right now for only $10 more (indeed I checked and it is true) Nvidia had better start making something in the $150-$165 price range that IS meant for 1080p.

 

[dscudella]

Some heads up GPU comparisons from Anandtech

650 Ti vs 7770 The 650 Ti pretty much dominates
650 Ti vs 6850 About a 60% win for the 650 Ti
650 Ti vs 6870 The 650 Ti meets it's price point match, about a 30% win ratio
650 Ti vs 7850 Unfortunately the 650 Ti gets dominated by the 7850.
650 Ti vs 550 Ti This is the GPU the 650 Ti is replacing and it does a great job at doing so
650 Ti vs 560 Ti Just for S&G's the 560 Ti wins hands down
650 Ti vs 470 Both cards are on par performance wise but when it comes to power usage, heat & noise levels the 605 Ti is the hands down winner

So the 650 Ti does a great replacing your older 550 Ti's, goes blow for blow with the GTX 470 but loses to a stronger 560 Ti along with AMD's GPU's at the same price.