Although most of the attention in the PC hardware world these days is focused on the high-end graphics cards such as Nvidia’s GTX 1080 Ti and AMD’s upcoming Vega-based cards (which look likely to offer unprecedented levels of performance), there is a new card in town aimed at pleasing the needs of those on tighter budgets.
This is because Nvidia has just released the GT 1030 graphics card, which is strictly aimed at the lower-end segment of the graphics card market. And this is reflected in both the card’s features and price, as it will be shipping with 2 GB of memory, a 64 bit memory interface and only 384 CUDA cores.
For comparison’s sake, the high-end GTX 1080 Ti boasts 3584 CUDA cores, a 352 bit memory interface and 11 GB of memory.
Of course, the GT 1030’s big advantage is price, as it will retail at around $75 in the US. So what kind of user is this aimed at? The GT 1030 will probably satisfy you needs if you are into eSports games like Counter-Strike and League of Legends, or have a compact PC which you use as a multimedia machine. The GT 1030 has support for 4K resolution and multi-monitor support via three display connectors (DisplayPort, HDMI and DVI). It’s also a low-power, compact card that will fit almost any case (actually, some manufacturers have already announced single-slot versions of the card according to PC World).
However, those looking to play modern games like Mass Effect Andromeda will likely want to look elsewhere, as the GT 1030 simply does not have the horsepower to handle the latest AAA games well. Nvidia’s mid-range offerings like the GTX 1050 and GTX 1050 Ti are far more capable when it comes to gaming, and with the former going for not much more than the GT 1030 right now it seems like a better choice if you are planning to do any serious gaming at all.
But still, it’s nice to see a company like Nvidia delivering a card that caters for those with more basic computing needs, and might turn out to be a success in a year which might still deliver more surprises on the PC hardware front.
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GT 1030 card (EVGA)