nVidia just seem to have released a GT1030 specially against the Radeon RX 550. What is so special about the Radeon RX 500 series?
Let's start with the RX 550
The RX 550 is a very capable card in view of its power needs, a mere 50 Watt. Those willing to spend a little more on purchase and power bills can choose for the even more capable RX 560
Model/Type GPU Fab
(nm)Shaders TMU ROP GFLOP SP GFLOP DP GFLOP HP TBP Gflop(SP)
/WattGflop(DP)
/WattGflop(HP)
/WattRadeon RX 500 Series 1/16
of SP Radeon RX 540 (OEM) Cape Verde PRX 28 512 32 16 1248 78.0 ? 65 19.20 1.20 ? Radeon RX 550 Polaris 12 14 512 32 16 1211 75.7 1211 50 24.22 1.51 24.22 Radeon RX 560 Polaris 11 14 1024 64 16 2406 150.4 2406 80 30.01 1.88 30.01 Radeon RX 570 Polaris 20 14 2048 128 32 4784 300.0 4784 150 31.89 2.00 31.89 Radeon RX 580 Polaris 20 14 2304 144 32 5792 362.0 5792 185 31.31 2.13 31.31 Radeon Pro Duo Polaris 2x Polaris 20 14 4608 288 64 11456 716.0 11456 250 45.82 2.86 45.82
The TBP (Typical Board Power) of the RX 560 is actually 60-80 Watt, so the GFLOPS/Watt may be even better yet.
What does nVidia offer?
*=Normal values unknown yet. For the Titan Xp I only know of the 'Turbo boost' values, at the moment.
Model/Type GPU Fab
(nm)Shaders TMU ROP GFLOP SP GFLOP DP GFLOP HP TBP Gflop(SP)
/WattGflop(DP)
/WattGflop(HP)
/WattGeforce 10 Series 1/32
of SP GeForce GT 1030 GP108-300-A1 16 384 24 8 952 30 15 30 31.73 1.00 0.50 GeForce GTX 1050 GP107-300-A1 14 640 40 32 1733 54 27 75 23.11 0.72 0.36 GeForce GTX 1050 Ti GP107-400-A1 14 768 48 32 1981 62 31 75 26.41 0.83 0.41 GeForce GTX 1060 3GB GP106-300-A1 16 1152 72 48 3470 108 54 120 28.92 0.90 0.45 GeForce GTX 1060 6GB GP106-400/410-A1 16 1280 80 48 3855 120 60 120 32.13 1.00 0.50 GeForce GTX 1070 GP104-200-A1 16 1920 120 64 5783 181 90 150 38.56 1.21 0.60 GeForce GTX 1080 GP104-400/410-A1 16 2560 160 64 8228 257 128 180 45.71 1.43 0.71 GeForce GTX 1080 Ti GP102-350-K1-A1 16 3584 224 88 10609 332 166 250 42.44 1.33 0.66 nVidia Titan X GP102-400-A1 16 3584 224 96 10157 317 159 250 40.63 1.27 0.64 nVidia Titan Xp GP102-450-A1 16 3840 240 96 12150* 380* 190* 250 48.61 1.52 0.76
Considering the fact that most projects only ask for Single precision, the GT 1030 offers real value. But when we take double precision performance (e.g. MilkyWay) into account, nVidia is fighting a lost battle as they have sacrificed that feature to boost the sales of their professional (Quadro/Tesla) cards. I do not know yet of the effects of the half-precision performance, but nVidia seems to have made the wrong choice there too by offering Half-precision at 1/64th of the Single precision while AMD offers it at the same GFLOPS as the single precision. There ought to be projects where AMD cards smash the nVidia cards, performance-wise.