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NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3050 Review: An entry-level card that delivers DLSS to the masses

By The Count - 3 May 2022

Final Thoughts

Final thoughts

The GeForce RTX 3050 is a great graphics card for the 1080p masses and delivers DLSS (and a bit of ray tracing, depending on the games) and other RTX 30-series tech such as NVIDIA IO and Reflex to gamers looking for a suitable replacement for their ageing GeForce GTX 1650/1650 Ti. It helps NVIDIA that there’s no genuine alternative from AMD, their only competition. I haven’t reviewed the red company’s own entry-level Radeon 6500 XT but the consensus on the Internet is that it’s one card to be avoided even with its lower US$199 price point, mostly because its frame buffer size is inadequate. 

The only problem with the RTX 3050, however, is the same every time NVIDIA launches a new RTX 30-series card – it’s impossible to buy these cards at their suggested retail price (SRP). That is if you can even find them at all. At US$249, the RTX 3050 is great value for your money in today’s market, but I’d wager that NVIDIA’s board partners like Gigabyte, MSI and ASUS will not be able to keep to SRP prices due to well-known supply issues as well as hoardings from crypto miners. This has happened for well over a year, and it’s unlikely that supplies of RTX 3050 cards will fare any better than say, the RTX 3060 or even the RTX 3080 cards.

What gamers really want for 2022 is to be able to buy their graphics cards at sane prices.

But let’s give credit where it’s due. NVIDIA has already owned the high-end gaming market with the GeForce RTX 3070, 3080 and 3090 cards. With the GeForce RTX 3060 and now the RTX 3050, the entry-to-mid segments are theirs to dominate for the rest of the year too.

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7.5
  • Performance 7.5
  • Features 8
  • Value 7.5
The Good
Quite possibly the best entry-level GPU in the market
Brings DLSS, IO and Reflex to the masses
Reasonably priced
8GB VRAM
The Bad
Unlikely cards will sell at SRP
The RTX 3060 is the better value card
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