Feature Articles

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 650 - The Affordable Kepler

By Kenny Yeo - 24 Sep 2012

Conclusion

Not a KO Victory

NVIDIA had said that Kepler would change the game, and it did. The new Kepler chip introduced storming performance and incredible efficiency, and really shook things up for enthusiasts. Six months on, and NVIDIA has finally made Kepler affordable and available to mainstream gamers, but has it lost some of its luster?

In the case of the GeForce GTX 650, the answer depends on how you look at it. Essentially a boosted GeForce GT 640, the GeForce GTX 650 has much less hardware than the GeForce GTX 660. With less than half the number of CUDA cores and texture mapping units, significantly less raster operating units and memory bandwidth, the GeForce GTX 650 is much weaker on paper than the GeForce GTX 660 and the results shows. In our testing, we found that the GeForce GTX 650 was only around half its performance.

However, the GeForce GTX 660 is also twice as expensive. And bearing in mind the fact that we test our cards at maximum or near maximum graphics quality settings, the GeForce GTX 650 actually held itself pretty well. If one were to tune the graphics settings down a notch or two, the GeForce GTX 650 could easily hold itself well right up to full HD 1920 x 1080 pixels resolution. Furthermore, compared to its direct rival, the Radeon HD 7750, it was quicker in almost all instances and often by a healthy margin of around 10%. In some cases, it could even rival the costlier Radeon HD 7770. Therefore, if you take US pricing into account, the GeForce GTX 650 is the better buy if you are looking for a graphics card in the US$100 bracket.

The MSI GTX 650 Power Edition is an excellent and eager overclocker with an interesting and somewhat effective TwinThermal cooling solution.

Locally, however, retail prices tell a different story mostly because Radeon HD 7750 cards are significantly cheaper. At the time of writing, Radeon HD 7750 cards are going for mostly around S$180, while the GeForce GTX 650 cards are pegged at around S$220. And when you consider that for S$220 you could also get a Radeon HD 7770, which is at least as quick as if not quicker, then suddenly, the GeForce GTX 650 looks less tempting.

In this very price sensitive segment of the market, it is therefore important to pay attention to your local market pricing. But on a whole, the GeForce GTX 650 is an accomplished card that rewards you with full HD gaming so long as you are willing to sacrifice a bit of graphics quality and features such as GPU Boost and SLI.

In conclusion, unlike the earlier higher-end Kepler cards, the GeForce GTX 650 does not score a convincing KO victory over its competitor, at least in the Singapore market. While the GeForce GTX 650 might be faster, it also costs more and we are not entirely convinced that the added performance is justified, especially if you are on a tight budget.

As for the MSI GTX 650 Power Edition, it has a local pricing of S$219, which is reasonable considering its boosted clock speeds and additional features. In stock form, it offers a marginal performance boost over a reference GeForce GTX 650, but its appeal lies in its overclockability. In overclocked form, it managed to give as much as a 10% boost in performance, which can be appreciable especially in more demanding usage scenarios.

The TwinThermal cooling system is an interesting feature but a bit of a novelty. Although we recorded noticeable cooling performance especially with the additional fan along side the existing one in a dual-fan array, stacking the additional fan on top of the existing one doesn’t make much sense since it doesn’t improve cooling performance as much. It also turns the MSI GTX 650 Power Edition into a triple-slot card, which can be tricky to manage if you have a more compact casing or if you are using a micro-ATX board and have other PCI/PCIe add-on cards.

Final Ratings

The GeForce GTX 650 SKU

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The MSI GTX 650 Power Edition

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