I recently built my wife a very inexpensive gaming PC. She mainly plays indie co-op games with me and occasionally plays cozy games on her own. The system uses a Ryzen 7 2700, Gigabyte B450M motherboard, 32GB of DDR4 memory, and a 256GB SSD, connected to a 1080p 60Hz monitor that she has no plans to replace.
I found a used RX 6600 for $150, but installed my old RX 580 first to test the system. So far, Ale & Tale Tavern, The Wild Eight, Outward, Chorus, and Journey to the Savage Planet all run around 50–60 FPS at medium-to-high settings, which is good enough for the monitor.
Now I'm wondering whether returning the RX 6600 would be reasonable. The RX 580 handles everything she currently plays, but the RX 6600 would provide more performance, better efficiency, and extra room for future games. Since the entire PC cost less than $200 to build with the RX 580, spending $150 on the newer card feels like a significant upgrade. Should I keep the RX 6600 or stick with the RX 580 and perhaps sell or save the newer card?
3 Answers
For the games listed, the RX 580 is completely adequate. Some of them are light enough to run well on much older hardware, so you’re not imagining the results. If this computer will only ever be used for those games at 1080p and 60 FPS, returning the RX 6600 wouldn’t be unreasonable. However, the newer card gives you a lot more flexibility if you eventually try more demanding games, and $150 is a good price for that headroom.
I’d keep the RX 6600. The RX 580 is doing fine right now, but it’s an older card with less remaining driver support, higher power consumption, and a greater chance of becoming a limitation in newer games. The 6600 is much faster and should remain useful for considerably longer, especially at 1080p. $150 is a solid price, and you could sell the RX 580 to reduce the effective cost.
The RX 6600 is basically a modern, more efficient replacement for the RX 580. It should deliver substantially higher performance while using less power, and it offers newer features and longer-term support. The Ryzen 7 2700 is perfectly suitable for this target, so I’d install the RX 6600 and either sell the RX 580 or keep it as an emergency backup. Keeping both is also reasonable if recovering the $50 or so from selling the old card isn’t worth the hassle.
I didn’t realize the power difference was that noticeable. I may sell the RX 580 after confirming the RX 6600 works properly.
That makes sense. I hadn’t really considered the driver support and power differences since the RX 580 is currently meeting the frame-rate target.