The Prime Day is on, and there are also graphics cards from AMD and Nvidia on sale. However, there are a few deals you should definitely avoid, as they hardly pay off in 2023.
On Prime Day, you will also find some graphics cards from AMD and Nvidia. While some GPUs do represent a meaningful upgrade, such as the RTX 3060 Ti, there are some products where we would advise against a purchase.
Especially 2 models are hardly worthwhile today and are already long outdated. There are simply better alternatives on sale.
All meaningful deals can also be found in our ticker for Prime Day:
Radeon RX 550
What is the problem? The RX 550 is an outdated entry-level graphics card. In 2023, integrated graphics chips from AMD CPUs (so-called APUs) already offer more graphical power than these graphics cards.
100 euros sounds tempting at first, but for just 50 euros more, you can get an RX 6500 XT, which not only offers a significantly better GPU architecture but also much more performance in Full HD. The RX 6500 XT is not a perfect graphics card either, but for the extra cost, it is significantly better than the old Polaris model.
For a pure office system, we would generally recommend an AMD CPU with a graphics chip, such as the Ryzen 5 5600G, which can also handle many games at low settings. And you can now get the Ryzen 5 5600G in stores for around 100 euros, making it the same price as the RX 550.
A helpful comparison video has been made by the YouTuber “High FPS”. Here you can see that the iGPU of the Ryzen 5 5600G is almost always a bit faster than the Radeon RX 550:
GeForce GT 1030
The GeForce GT 1030 has a similar problem as the RX 550, as it is already several years old. The card was officially released in March 2018 and experienced a resurgence during the mining boom in the COVID phase. At times, the GT 1030 was sold for nearly 200 euros.
We would currently advise you against purchasing a GT 1030. On Prime Day, you pay an average of 100 euros for this card. For just 50 euros more, you can get the also reduced GTX 1650, which offers you significantly more performance. Especially with modern games, you stand absolutely no chance with the GT 1030 anymore.
For a small office or streaming system in the living room, it is just adequate, but you cannot utilize 4K streaming. Nvidia considers the GTX 1050 (Ti) as the minimum requirement for 4K. For a pure office system, we would also recommend an Ryzen 5 5600G or a comparable processor. This can be used in a mini system thanks to its low consumption and waste heat.
Recommended graphics cards from Nvidia can be found in our buying guide on MeinMMO:
Buy Nvidia graphics card 2023 – Which one is worth it for me?
Beware of too cheap graphics cards
Fraudsters are also active on Amazon and take the opportunity to scam innocent buyers during Prime Day. Therefore, double-check the offers and think carefully about whether someone is really offering hardware for little money, or if a user is playing a nasty prank.
Additionally, pay attention to things like seller ratings or the location. If it’s a completely new account or if the seller prefers to handle the purchase via WhatsApp or otherwise, immediately abort the purchase and involve Amazon!
User buys top GPU for 300 euros – Community explains to him why he will never see the graphics card
