Comparison of Intel Arc B580 and RTX 2080
Comparison of Intel Arc B580 and RTX 2080
Recently got a new monitor, and having a desktop upgraded last time 7 years ago for BFV (yep, that old) I'm sort of running low on VRAM. All else is working well (enough) to run my games on more or less ultra (it even ran BF2042 well. Uninstalled it but that's a different story)
So now that the VRAM is the only concern, I'm thinking to upgrade my GPU as I'm planning to do a fully-featured upgrade (new CPU/mobo/RAM/PSU) in a few years, when DDR6 comes out, so maybe in a couple of years. So there's no real good point for me to upgrade all the way to RTX 50xx (Ti) simply because my RTX 2080 can run most games just fine. (Yes, I do have a few demanding games, but I can wait for a 3-4 more years, given that I have a GPU with more RAM.)
So.. the question is, is it a good point? I found some B580s on Newegg for as low as $250, which, to my opinion, is fine, given that it's only maybe like 1.25-1.5x more powerful than my RTX 2080. Since I couldn't find a good, reliable, direct comparison, I used this chart to do a more or less rough comparison:
https://gamersnexus.net/gpus/intel-...en...-7600-more
. I know that there's RTX 3060, but RTX 2080 is somewhere in between RTX 3060 and 3060 Ti, so that should be more or less reliable comparison (but feel free to correct me if I'm wrong or if you find better comparison, but then keep in mind that one RTX 2080 is different from another, and so if you compare it to a reference card and then to my card... the difference may be a few FPS.)
My current rig:
i7 8700k
32GB of RAM
RTX 2080
800W PSU (7 years old but I'll replace that in a couple years along with all other components)
That should be sufficient. Monitor - 3440x1440, FreeSync with G-Sync compatibility, so it's not quite 2K nor 4K; somewhere in between. (But this monitor is pretty epic, I really enjoy it)
B580 is available only if your motherboard supports a resizable bar (rebar). I didn’t encounter any driver problems with WoW, Metaphor, Elden Ring or BG3 at 1440 60+ fps, even with ray tracing enabled. The older CPU issues are mostly resolved (see recent Hardware Unboxed analysis). The GPU is a good deal if it meets your needs and you can afford to wait a couple years before upgrading.
800W PSU is the stated power rating, but I plan to swap it out in a few years along with other parts.
The actual model number isn't specified, but the power rating suggests it could be an RX 9070 XT or RTX 5070 Ti if it supports 1440p.
I think it's better to invest in a full build rather than relying on discrete GPUs, especially with the driver issues.
This isn't a complete upgrade, just a temporary solution to keep my games running at ultra/high settings for the next couple of years. The 1.5x FPS improvement isn't a full horizontal upgrade, though I get what you mean. I'm fine with using a used GPU or even doing some risky fixes like soldering more RAM directly onto it. But that would be complicated, and finding a compatible donor with the same VRAM and speeds would be difficult. I'm not talking about custom BIOS or drivers.
However, I got sidetracked. I can wait a few years with this GPU, but my game list would get smaller because I'd need to find more games that use less VRAM for higher settings. Right now I have a few games, but they're limited. If you have any good titles in mind (except for Battlefield), I'm open to suggestions. Besides that, I'm considering getting a new GPU. I wouldn't want to spend more than around $300, so while I'd rather wait than buy a new one now, having extra VRAM would be beneficial. That's all I'm saying.
B580 is available only if your motherboard supports a resizable bar (rebar). I didn’t encounter any driver problems with WoW, Metaphor, Elden Ring or BG3 at 1440 60+ fps, even with ray tracing enabled. The older CPU issues are mostly resolved (see recent Hardware Unboxed analysis). The GPU is a good deal if it meets your needs and you can afford to wait a couple years before upgrading.
i chose the 9060xt because it offers a solid balance between cost and performance. it should handle 1440p smoothly enough for the price. i won’t push every game to 200 fps, but it should work based on the reviews I’ve seen.
i mainly use 1080p and it performs well there, though it’s a decent 1440p card for around $350. avoid the 8gb versions if possible.
Thanks for the tip on ReBAR, Gururu. There is a beta version of the BIOS with support for it, but then there's another (full) version, so.. I'd assume, the full version does have it as well?
MathGeek, $350 is a bit too much for a card that'd hold for only a couple years. If I were to upgrade like 2-3 years ago to 9060 xt, sure, that would make sense; but back then it wasn't worth it because the cards from that time would sort of compare to RTX 2080 (just a guess... if I'm wrong, say it) but even then, why would I upgrade to a GPU that I'd not use to the fullest? I got a new monitor only this year, so if I were not planning to get it any time soon, I'd not need to upgrade... What I'm trying to say is that I'm not really ready to pay that much for a GPU that wouldn't hold for long.
i wasn't really paying attention, but i'm hoping you can understand something that fits your situation. just wanted to share what happened when buying recently. good luck!
You're way over estimating the performance difference between your RTX 2080, the B580, and RTX 3060 TI. On average the B580 is going to be a half tier up above your RTX 2080 that is already about RTX 4060/5050 performance. That is only like 15% difference, nowhere near a 25-50% upliftyou are thinking. To get a 25-35% uplift you would need an RX 6750 XT, RTX 2080 TI, or 3070.
A 40-50% uplift would be an RTX 3070 TI or RX 6800 non xt for older cards, and an RTX 5060 TI 16GB or RX 9060 XT 16GB for newer cards. An RTX 5070 or RX 9070 non XT would be more like a 80-85% uplift, and probably be worth waiting for the 5070 Super refresh with 18GB vram, because the 5070 will likely drop in price or people will be off-loading their used 4070 Supers for a decent price.
So really your best options for being anywhere near the uplift you want for a cheaper card would be the 5060 TI 16GB or RX 9060 XT 16GB, if you want a 50% upgrade that could potentially last you for 2-3 years before your next full upgrade. And despite what people keep saying, the 5060 TI 16GB is actually not terrible on a PCIe 3.0 system since it won't need to be doing all of that file swapping into system ram to make up for the lack of vram on the 8GB version that kill the performance at higher settings.
I'd say you're either better off getting an RTX 5060 TI 16GB or RX 9060 XT, or spending extra for a 5070 TI or RX 9070 XT, or even waiting for the RTX 5070 TI Super with 24GB vram with possibly near 5080 performance.
The driver overhead would discourage me from choosing an Arc card with your CPU. There have been some improvements, as HUB showed in the video we discussed before, but the performance remains quite unstable. The used market might be your most reliable option. You could also look for a good deal on an RX 6700xt, 6750xt or 6800. If you need more than 8GB of VRAM, a 9600xt 16GB card seems to offer the best value right now.