GeForce RTX 3050 8 GB vs Maxwell GPU Surface Book (940M, GDDR5)

Place in the ranking	713	165
Place by popularity	not in top-100	11
Cost-effectiveness evaluation	no data	69.40
Power efficiency	no data	17.29
Architecture	Maxwell (2014−2017)	Ampere (2020−2024)
GPU code name	Surface Book	GA106
Market segment	Laptop	Desktop
Release date	1 October 2015 (9 years ago)	4 January 2022 (2 years ago)
Launch price (MSRP)	no data	$249

Cost-effectiveness evaluation

Performance to price ratio. The higher, the better.

no data

Detailed specifications

General parameters such as number of shaders, GPU core base clock and boost clock speeds, manufacturing process, texturing and calculation speed. Note that power consumption of some graphics cards can well exceed their nominal TDP, especially when overclocked.

Pipelines / CUDA cores	384	2560
Core clock speed	954 MHz	1552 MHz
Boost clock speed	993 MHz	1777 MHz
Number of transistors	no data	12,000 million
Manufacturing process technology	28 nm	8 nm
Power consumption (TDP)	no data	130 Watt
Texture fill rate	no data	142.2
Floating-point processing power	no data	9.098 TFLOPS
ROPs	no data	32
TMUs	no data	80
Tensor Cores	no data	80
Ray Tracing Cores	no data	20

Form factor & compatibility

Information on compatibility with other computer components. Useful when choosing a future computer configuration or upgrading an existing one. For desktop graphics cards it's interface and bus (motherboard compatibility), additional power connectors (power supply compatibility).

Interface	no data	PCIe 4.0 x8
Length	no data	242 mm
Width	no data	2-slot
Supplementary power connectors	no data	1x 8-pin

VRAM capacity and type

Parameters of VRAM installed: its type, size, bus, clock and resulting bandwidth. Integrated GPUs have no dedicated video RAM and use a shared part of system RAM.

Memory type	GDDR5	GDDR6
Maximum RAM amount	1 GB	8 GB
Memory bus width	64 Bit	128 Bit
Memory clock speed	5012 MHz	1750 MHz
Memory bandwidth	no data	224.0 GB/s
Shared memory	-	-

Connectivity and outputs

Types and number of video connectors present on the reviewed GPUs. As a rule, data in this section is precise only for desktop reference ones (so-called Founders Edition for NVIDIA chips). OEM manufacturers may change the number and type of output ports, while for notebook cards availability of certain video outputs ports depends on the laptop model rather than on the card itself.

Display Connectors	no data	1x HDMI 2.1, 3x DisplayPort 1.4a
HDMI	-	+

Supported technologies

Supported technological solutions. This information will prove useful if you need some particular technology for your purposes.

Optimus

API compatibility

List of supported 3D and general-purpose computing APIs, including their specific versions.

DirectX	DirectX 12 (FL 11_0), Shader 5.0	12 Ultimate (12_2)
Shader Model	no data	6.6
OpenGL	no data	4.6
OpenCL	no data	3.0
Vulkan	-	1.3
CUDA	+	8.6

Gaming performance

Let's see how good the compared graphics cards are for gaming. Particular gaming benchmark results are measured in FPS.

Average FPS across all PC games

Here are the average frames per second in a large set of popular games across different resolutions:

Full HD

−757%

240−250
+757%

Cost per frame, $

1080p

no data

1.04

FPS performance in popular games

Full HD
Medium Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey	10−12 −764%	95−100 +764%
Battlefield 5	8−9 −775%	70−75 +775%
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare	8−9 −775%	70−75 +775%
Far Cry 5	7−8 −757%	60−65 +757%
Far Cry New Dawn	10−11 −750%	85−90 +750%
Forza Horizon 4	21−24 −757%	180−190 +757%
Red Dead Redemption 2	9−10 −733%	75−80 +733%
Shadow of the Tomb Raider	14−16 −757%	120−130 +757%

Full HD
High Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey	10−12 −764%	95−100 +764%
Battlefield 5	8−9 −775%	70−75 +775%
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare	8−9 −775%	70−75 +775%
Far Cry 5	7−8 −757%	60−65 +757%
Far Cry New Dawn	10−11 −750%	85−90 +750%
Forza Horizon 4	21−24 −757%	180−190 +757%
Metro Exodus	6−7 −733%	50−55 +733%
Red Dead Redemption 2	9−10 −733%	75−80 +733%
Shadow of the Tomb Raider	14−16 −757%	120−130 +757%
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt	14−16 −767%	130−140 +767%

Full HD
Ultra Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey	10−12 −764%	95−100 +764%
Battlefield 5	8−9 −775%	70−75 +775%
Far Cry 5	7−8 −757%	60−65 +757%
Far Cry New Dawn	10−11 −750%	85−90 +750%
Forza Horizon 4	21−24 −757%	180−190 +757%
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt	14−16 −767%	130−140 +767%

1440p
High Preset

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare	3−4 −700%	24−27 +700%
Red Dead Redemption 2	7−8 −757%	60−65 +757%

1440p
Ultra Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey	3−4 −700%	24−27 +700%
Battlefield 5	6−7 −733%	50−55 +733%
Far Cry 5	4−5 −775%	35−40 +775%
Far Cry New Dawn	6−7 −733%	50−55 +733%
Forza Horizon 4	2−3 −700%	16−18 +700%

4K
High Preset

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare	1−2 −700%	8−9 +700%
Red Dead Redemption 2	4−5 −775%	35−40 +775%

4K
Ultra Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey	2−3 −700%	16−18 +700%
Battlefield 5	2−3 −700%	16−18 +700%
Far Cry 5	2−3 −700%	16−18 +700%
Far Cry New Dawn	2−3 −700%	16−18 +700%
Forza Horizon 4	2−3 −700%	16−18 +700%

This is how Maxwell GPU Surface Book (940M, GDDR5) and RTX 3050 8 GB compete in popular games:

RTX 3050 8 GB is 757% faster in 1080p

Pros & cons summary

Performance score	3.69	32.75
Recency	1 October 2015	4 January 2022
Maximum RAM amount	1 GB	8 GB
Chip lithography	28 nm	8 nm

RTX 3050 8 GB has a 787.5% higher aggregate performance score, an age advantage of 6 years, a 700% higher maximum VRAM amount, and a 250% more advanced lithography process.

The GeForce RTX 3050 8 GB is our recommended choice as it beats the Maxwell GPU Surface Book (940M, GDDR5) in performance tests.

Be aware that Maxwell GPU Surface Book (940M, GDDR5) is a notebook card while GeForce RTX 3050 8 GB is a desktop one.

Should you still have questions concerning choice between the reviewed GPUs, ask them in Comments section, and we shall answer.