NVIDIA outs budget-priced GeForce 660 and 650 cards

NVIDIA is attempting to appeal to budget-conscious PC gamers with its latest pair of offerings. The Kepler-based GeForce GTX 660 and GTX 650 will cost $229 and $109, respectively. The former has 2GB of dedicated RAM and 960 CUDA cores along with a GPU Boost mode that automatically overclocks it as needed. There is also a 980MHz core clock onboard.<br><br>NVIDIA cites a four-fold performance improvement when compared to the older GeForce 9800GT card. The quoted frame rates in games like <Em>Borderlands 2</em> and <em>Guild Wars 2</em> at 1,920 by 1,080 resolutions and 3D are said to be 51fps and 41fps, respectively.

The GTX 650 is the least costly Kepler card NVIDIA will release, lacking GPU Boost. It has a 1,058MHz clock speed and NVIDIA claims eight-time better performance than the 9500 GT(II). There is 1GB of dedicated RAM and 384 CUDA Cores.

The cards are now shipping as standalone products and bundled with systems from a number of manufacturers.

Actually no. The GT 640 is the least costly Kepler card, and it was released months ago. Same chip, but only with DDR3 memory (the 650 has GDDR5 support) and probably lower clocks.