I’m looking to upgrade my son’s gaming setup and need advice on graphics cards. He’s been playing a lot of No Man’s Sky and similar exploration games, but right now he’s stuck with the integrated graphics of his R5 5600G. I have two options: a 3050, which I know isn’t top-tier but is definitely better than what’s currently in use, or a 4060 from a friend who still has it in the box. My concern is about potential bottlenecks, especially with the 4060.
2 Answers
In terms of the bottleneck situation, the 4060 actually performs better with the R5 5600G than you might think. Despite the integrated graphics being PCIe 3.0, it can still handle the full x16 lanes of the 4060 pretty well. If your son is gaming at 1080p, he likely won’t experience major issues. The 3050 will be better than nothing, but considering he plays exploration games, the 4060 might give him a much smoother experience overall.
I’d be cautious about the 4060’s performance though. It’s true that it runs with full lanes; however, some users mention it defaults to PCI-E 8x bandwidth, which might cause headaches if the VRAM gets maxed out. If you’re really serious about gaming, and if he plans to play demanding titles, I’d lean towards the 4060 despite the potential bottleneck, since it generally outperforms the 3050.
