The year 2022 is coming to an end, and just in time for Christmas we look back at the important things to do with PC hardware, which are also more or less interesting for gamers. You can read what the year initially announced in our CES 2022 special, which we published on January 7th. In the end, as we now know, the main focus was on graphics cards. Because after an almost crazy delivery and price cycle in 2021, prices have been falling steadily since the beginning of 2022 and are now below their respective recommended prices for many series. In addition, four new top graphics cards from AMD and Nvidia appeared, which also heralded a new AMD and Nvidia generation at the same time.
But there were also more than a handful of other new graphics cards in 2022. Another point is processors, because Intel and AMD each launched a brand new CPU generation and AMD also launched a completely new socket, and existing generations were supplemented. Another topic is SSDs, whose prices have become increasingly affordable. We also published specials on many topics, which we will link to accordingly in the text.
Nvidia – graphics cards and shield prank
When it comes to the new releases for 2022, most people probably think of the GeForce RTX 4090 and RTX 4080, which gave the starting signal for the new generation Ada Lovelace. Overall, Nvidia has launched three more new graphics cards in the current year – the GeForce RTX 3050 hit the stores at the end of January, although we do not recommend this graphics card because the AMD Radeon RX 6600, which is about the same price, is over 35 percent faster. But the 3000 flagship GeForce RTX 3090 Ti only saw the light of day this year, towards the end of March. This model series was never a purchase recommendation from us, since it was strong but far too expensive and still is. With its 24GB GDDR6X RAM, like the normal RTX 3090, it is aimed more at professional users. The topic of RAM plays a role in the third 3000 release in 2022, because in January Nvidia launched the 12GB version of the GeForce RTX 3080 – the normal version only offers 10GB RAM.
Gainward GeForce RTX 4080 Phantom
Source: Gainward
The two Nvidia stars are of course the Ada Lovelace starters GeForce RTX 4080 and 4090. The latter surprised even experienced testers, as the performance increase compared to the GeForce RTX 3090 (Ti) is enormous at 40 to 50 percent. But: the price of over 2000 euros is also enormous. Therefore, the GeForce RTX 4090 is not a purchase recommendation. For comparison: The RTX 4090 is 50 to 60 percent faster than AMD’s 6950 XT, but costs 130 percent more, so significantly more than double. The GeForce RTX 4080 doesn’t fare much better in terms of value for money. The performance increase compared to the AMD Radeon RX 6950 XT is at least 25 to 30 percent, but the surcharge is 70 percent. Nevertheless, Nvidia shows that big steps are possible in terms of performance. On the next page we will take a close look at what AMD has done in terms of graphics cards. But at the end of the Nvidia chapter there is still a prank on the shield missing.
This is not a typo, because it has just been announced that Nvidia will remove the network-internal streaming function for games on its own PC from its Shield streaming console. You can still use the Nvidia Shield and its controller to remotely control your own networked PC that has a sufficiently powerful Nvidia graphics card via the GeForce Experience app and play all the games that the PC can handle via the display connected to the Shield . From February 2023 this will end with an update. Users should use other solutions such as the Steam streaming function. For many Shield users, the device is now virtually useless. In our news from Wednesday we go into the details and comment on the Shieldbürger prank for which we can see no logical reason.
