Gameplay Performance
We are going to focus on the 1080p gameplay performance and gameplay experience with the EVGA GeForce RTX 3050 XC BLACK GAMING Video Card. Remember, we are testing at the higher clocked 3050 XC SKU with a 1845MHz GPU Boost in all our data. We will test Ray Tracing and DLSS and FSR in the games that support it in our testing suite. We will show these features under each relevant game. You will find DLSS and FSR shown as extensions of performance over the base performance with or without Ray Tracing (RT). For video card comparisons we are using a GIGABYTE Radeon RX 6500 XT EAGLE 4G and an ASUS ROG STRIX GTX 1650 O4G GAMING.
Battlefield 2042
We are using the latest version of Battlefield 2042. Since this game is a multiplayer game, it is hard to test in a live environment and have consistency. Therefore, we chose to create a private Portal server, and test with no players, it’s the only way we can assure a consistent run-through. We created a custom team deathmatch and a manual run-through in the whole map.
In the first graph above we are playing at 1080p with the graphics preset set to “Ultra” which is the game’s highest setting. We do not have Ray Tracing enabled; however, we are utilizing Quality DLSS where available. At “Ultra” settings the Radeon RX 6500 XT chokes pretty hard at 36FPS, while the new GeForce RTX 3050 manages to play the game at a playable and smooth 74FPS. That’s a massive 106% performance increase, even without DLSS. Then, when you slap on DLSS it improves performance by another 14% making the difference with the RX 6500 XT a 135% performance difference.
This all comes down to the fact that the Radeon RX 6500 XT is choking on memory VRAM capacity, and overall bandwidth constraints the card has. The GeForce RTX 3050 does not have these constraints, and it allows a playable “Ultra” experience in Battlefield 2042. DLSS amplifies this and makes it run even faster.
Overclocking the EVGA GeForce RTX 3050 increases performance by 3%, and with DLSS it increases DLSS performance by 6%. The GeForce RTX 3050 is also many magnitudes faster than the GeForce GTX 1650, which is also very constrained in this game by its VRAM and other factors, it bottlenecks it down to literally 10FPS.
In this second graph above we have now lowered the game quality preset to “Medium” settings in Battlefield 2042. Medium level graphics is where the new Radeon RX 6500 XT is playable, providing 92FPS, so we wanted to match that with the GeForce RTX 3050 and see how they compare when neither is constrained at all by VRAM capacity.
The Radeon RX 6500 XT is playable, and of course, so is the GeForce RTX 3050. The GeForce RTX 3050 is still overall faster, but not as much as it was at “Ultra” settings. Here at “Medium” settings the GeForce RTX 3050 is 12% faster than the Radeon RX 6500 XT. When we turn on DLSS, performance improves by 15%, which is pretty large. When comparing DLSS to the Radeon RX 6500 XT the RTX 3050 is 28% faster.
Overclocking the EVGA GeForce RTX 3050 improves performance by 5%, and DLSS improves by 5%. The GeForce GTX 1650 is also playable at 60FPS, though obviously, it is the weakest one here. Compared to the GTX 1650 the new GeForce RTX 3050 is 69% faster.
In this third graph above we are now testing the fancier features of Battlefield 2042, namely Ray Traced Ambient Occlusion. The Radeon RX 6500 XT, and GeForce RTX 3050 support Ray Tracing, and the GTX 1650 does not.
We can enable Ray Tracing in this game and see if it’s playable at all. To our surprise, it actually is very playable on the GeForce RTX 3050 at 1080p and “Ultra” settings! In the graph above we are running “Ultra” game settings, the highest the game supports and the GeForce RTX 3050 is providing 61FPS average performance, turn on DLSS and it’s even better at 75.8FPS, a 24% performance improvement. Overclocking the GeForce RTX 3050 brings that performance up by 7% without DLSS and 4% with DLSS.
Ray Tracing is an obvious weak spot of the new Radeon RX 6500 XT here. At “Ultra” settings performance is choked down to just 16FPS average, and the game was terrible to try and play. The GeForce RTX 3050 is 274% faster without DLSS, and with DLSS it’s 362% faster.
Finally, to try and make it easier for the Radeon RX 6500 XT we brought the game down to “Medium” quality settings at 1080p with Ray Tracing. However, the game is still not playable on the Radeon RX 6500 XT at just near 50FPS. However, it is very playable still on the GeForce RTX 3050 at 80FPS and with DLSS 101FPS. This is 64% and 106% (respectively) faster than the Radeon RX 6500 XT.
Forza Horizon 5
This game does support Ray Tracing, and different levels of Ray Tracing are enabled using the presets on supported cards. However, our GTX does not support Ray Tracing. Therefore, we also disabled Ray Tracing to keep all the settings equal, so we are using the presets, but with Ray Tracing disabled so they match up on the first three graphs, then the other three graphs have Ray Tracing enabled without the 1650.
We are starting at the top in Forza Horizon 5 at 1080p by using the “Extreme” in-game quality preset, but we have disabled Ray Tracing. This is the game’s highest preset graphics setting, and once again we find the Radeon RX 6500 XT chokes at the higher graphics setting, but the GeForce RTX 3050 does not. It gives us a 55FPS average, while the Radeon RX 6500 XT is only at 29FPS average, which makes the GeForce RTX 3050 90% faster than the Radeon RX 6500 XT. It’s also much faster than the GTX 1650 at 112% faster. Overclocking the RTX 3050 improves performance by 5%.
What we are seeing here is that even though this is the highest game setting at 1080p, the GeForce RTX 3050 is actually playable, it has a playable gameplay experience, and the RX 6500 XT does not. But let’s move the graphics settings down a notch to make it easier on the RX 6500 XT in the graph below.
In this graph, we have moved the graphics setting down at 1080p to the “Ultra” graphics preset. We are no longer at the highest game settings, we are down a whole notch, and Ray Tracing is still disabled. Well, we still find a pretty big performance difference. The Radeon RX 6500 XT is not playable at 45FPS, but the GeForce RTX 3050 is very playable at near 70FPS. It’s 53% faster. Overclocking improves performance by 6%. The GeForce RTX 3050 is also much faster than the GTX 1650, in this case, 103% faster. But let’s give the Radeon RX 6500 XT even one more chance and lower the game settings to where it is playable.
In this graph, we have lowered the game settings down to “High” where the Radeon RX 6500 XT is now playable at 88FPS. The GeForce RTX 3050 is also playable, and it is now only 9% faster than the Radeon RX 6500 XT. Though it isn’t as fast at lower game settings, the point is it provides a playable “Ultra” and “Extreme” gameplay experience, whereas the Radeon RX 6500 XT does not, it’s only playable at “High” and lower.
In this graph, we have now enabled the Ray Tracing Quality option in Forza Horizon 5, basically the default preset options if you don’t change anything. We have the graphics preset set at “Extreme” which sets Ray Tracing Quality at “High” in this game. You can see that the GeForce RTX 3050 is very playable at 55FPS, in fact, it hasn’t lost any performance at all with Ray Tracing on. The Radeon RX 6500 XT however has lost a little bit of performance, and is at 24FPS and completely not playable. The GeForce RTX 3050 is 129% faster.
To give the Radeon RX 6500 XT a better chance we reduced the game settings down to the “Ultra” preset with Ray Tracing at “High” settings. The Radeon RX 6500 XT is still not very playable at 44FPS, but the GeForce RTX 3050 is very playable at 69FPS. It’s 57% faster.
Finally, we reduced the game settings to what is playable on the Radeon RX 6500 XT which is “High” preset with “Medium” Ray Tracing. Here the Radeon RX 6500 XT is 87FPS and playable, but the GeForce RTX 3050 is also playable and 10% faster. But remember, the 3050 is playable at Ultra and Extreme with Ray Tracing, whereas the RX 6500 XT is not.