An article talked about a gold plated RTX 5090 graphics card just for that added level of prestige, but is it even necessary?
One of the things I remember back in the 90’s and 2000’s was the rapid development of computer technology. The specs were far simpler back in those days. What you heard from your game depends on what sound card you had. A hugely popular graphics card at one point was known as the “Sound Blaster”. Hard drive space was measured in megabytes and portable storage, once upon a time, was pushing the limits at just a couple of megabytes. It was more than possible to fill up a floppy drive disk with text files.
Of course, a popular consumer complaint back in the day is that you spend all this money to buy a computer only to have it go largely obsolete within a year. Congratulations on getting that 200GB hard drive, but games can now take up a couple of gigs of space. It was a constant battle for the consumer and upgrading every couple of years made sense even if it hit the pocketbook hard.
The thing is, in the last several years, that has increasingly been less and less the case. You could very easily get a 1TB SSD hard drive and that would be enough to store plenty of games or movies. If you run out of space, then that’s more of a question of data management. You can always de-install something to save space.
Moreover, graphics cards have largely been able to handle a lot of what most users throw at it. Want to fire up Fallout 4, but only have a 6 year old graphics card? Not a problem! That game was released in 2015 anyway and you can probably pull off some decent settings in that game. Game availability is certainly not a problem these days. You can check out Steam or GoG and pick up a whole pile of different games – frequently at steep discount compared to the day it was released – and you will have no problem playing them.
In fact, the more modern stuff can also be run at lower settings and, as far as I’m concerned, you’d still have a decent enough time with it.
So, when I read a PCMag article about a gold plated RTX 5090, I rolled my eyes at how all unnecessary it all was. This was mostly for the idea of trying to get a graphics card gold plated in the first place.
Yet, even setting aside that, there is one thing that the newest graphics cards are boasting – and that is built in ray tracing. I tried looking for games that explicitly required such a spec and ran into problems trying to find a resource talking about games that say that you either support ray tracing or you are completely out of luck. There are, of course, resources talking about games that support ray tracing (such as this list, but not outright requiring it. I am aware that Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is a game that requires ray tracing, but I’m not too familiar with other games explicitly making ray tracing mandatory.
As a result, this does go back to what kind of gamer you are (since this is really the only area where this even comes close to this being a valid debate as far as I know). For clarity, the examples I’m providing are in the context of if you don’t have a graphics card that supports ray tracing and are looking at whether or not you need one. For greater certainty, I’m also talking about users who don’t really have any other hardware issues (if you do, then it might be something to consider when you replace that glitching clunker).
If you are a gamer that absolutely must play the absolute latest games out there and you have Indiana Jones and the great Circle as an absolute must-play on your gaming list, then yes, you’ll need it. Of course, this is a very very specific subset of gamers out there and, chances are, it’s a social status symbol at that point.
Now, let’s say you are a gamer that likes to play the most modern games, day one, but aren’t too terribly picky about which games you want to play. Well, at that point, you’ll still have a huge selection of games to play from. Yes, an increasing number of games support ray tracing, and, in the future, there’ll probably be more and more games in the next few years that will require it. At that point, it’s probably not a dire emergency you need to pick up the absolute latest graphics card tomorrow. In fact, you could probably happily enjoy another two or three years with your existing graphics card without too many problems unless you are absolutely desperate to enjoy the ray tracing immediately.
Now, at this point, some of you might be thinking: Drew, what difference does ray tracing have on a gaming experience? If there is a hugely noticeable difference, then chances are, there would be more people in the camp that wants that ray tracing. Well, that is a reasonable question and, luckily, there are video’s out there that showcase the differences between games with ray tracing and games without. An example of that is this video which you can see in the embed below.
The video actually challenges viewers to decide which game footage has ray tracing and which one does not. This along with some side by side comparisons. Personally, I can tell that there is a difference on a subtle level, but honestly, after guessing so many clips wrong, I’m personally in the camp that I wouldn’t really notice the difference. Still, it’s a great exercise for those who aren’t sure if they will or won’t tell the difference.
This, of course, isn’t the only test out there. Linus Tech Tips, for instance, ran a similar test 3 years ago and it was clear that even when you knew what to look for, it required quite a bit of effort to figure out whether ray tracing is on or off. If you squint hard enough, it’s possible to figure out if ray tracing is on or off.
As for the rest of gamers out there, the answer, for me anyway, probably won’t surprise you. If you are the type that likes to wait a year or two after a game is released so that the bugs can be worked out and you can get it on sale, then the number of games available to you widens considerably and you can probably do without a ray tracing graphics card for quite a while yet.
If you are like me and aren’t so high strung on playing the absolute latest games, well, you’re fine. The only thing that you have to be mindful of at this point, assuming you are on Windows 10, is if your machine is able to make the jump to Windows 11 or if you need to buy a whole new machine. OS compatibility is a much bigger thing to be concerned about if you are on Windows 10. If you are already on Windows 11, though, yeah, I wouldn’t worry about it at all. This especially if you are playing a game that is from, say, 2015, and think that it’s a good enough looking game.
Yes, as time goes on, ray tracing supporting graphics cards is going to be a bigger and bigger thing. For a number of users out there, you might end up just getting a card that supports it as something that was convenient at the time of purchase as opposed to a required necessity. For instance, the rig you are on is overheating a lot and an upgrade was clearly needed for other reasons. So, you end up buying a whole new rig and, conveniently enough, it came with a graphics card that supports ray tracing. I think that is a very realistic scenario for a lot of users out there.
Are there going to be aficionados out there that will freak out when a puddle doesn’t accurately reflect a distant skyline out there? Sure. I’m not denying that. If you are so gung-ho on wanting the absolute most realistic performance possible at every given moment of your life, and your rig already happens to support it, then sure, I don’t see why not. For other gamers out there that don’t feel the need to zoom in to the maximum zoom to figure out whether or not the game meets expectations, then I don’t see it being a dire emergency that you absolutely must buy a ray tracing supporting graphics card tomorrow at this point. It’s not going to be the end of the world if you hold off for a year or so, depending on your situation.
