The long wait for the Elden Ring DLC Shadow of Erdtree comes to an end. Early reviews have commended the game for its challenging difficulty, stunning environments, and eerie new enemy designs. The latest iteration expands the storyline to a new place called Land of Shadow. To enjoy the game at its fullest, you will need a decently powerful graphics card.
Don’t worry. You don’t need to burn a big hole in your pocket to get the right card. There are tons of budget options that are suitable for playing Elden Ring DLC Shadow of Erdtree. In this article, we will explore the five most recommended pocket-friendly GPUs that you can consider buying.
Note: This article is subjective and solely reflects the writer’s opinion.
System requirements
The new Elden Ring title is not much resource-intensive. Here are the complete system requirements:
Best budget GPUs for Elden Ring DLC Shadow of Erdtree
1) GeForce RTX 4060
With RTX 4060, you can enjoy games at 1080p without any throttling issues. It is highly power-efficient and supports all of Nvidia’s advanced technologies, including DLSS 3 with Frame Generation.
It has 3rd generation RT cores with shader execution reordering support. Overall, it is a strong choice for the Elden Ring DLC Shadow of the Erdtree, offering excellent performance with the potential for future-proofing.
The most impressive thing about this Team Green card is its efficiency, consuming only 115W at peak usage. With an average gaming power of 110W, this card provides fantastic performance per watt. That said, there are no big deal breakers to skip this GPU.
Pros:
- It is a super efficient card.
- You can expect a smooth gaming performance at higher settings.
- It comes with Nvidia’s key technologies.
Cons:
- It might be a pricier option compared to other options.
2) AMD Radeon RX 7600
The RX 7600 brings the RDNA 3 architecture to the budget GPUs. It can deliver fantastic 1080p performance and even some decent 1440p chops. In terms of performance, it comes with major improvement over its predecessor.
You roughly get a 20% jump in the number of transistors, 6nm TSMC fabrication process, and four additional compute units. All these attributes establish it as one of the best budget GPUs to play Elden Ring DLC Shadow of Erdtree.
The RX 7600 is a powerful chip, but this performance comes at the cost of power consumption. It is a very power-hungry card with a TDP of 165W. This might lead to some heating issues. Apart from that, it falls short on ray tracing and FSR performance compared to Nvidia’s options.
Pros:
- It delivers outstanding gaming performance.
- The pricing is apt.
Cons:
- You might have some heating issues without a good cooling system.
3) Intel Arc A750
The Intel Arc A750 offers an excellent price-to-performance ratio. It can easily handle the Elden Ring DLC Shadow of Erdtree with high settings at 1080p resolution.
Interestingly, its ray-tracing performance is on the same level as RTX graphics cards, which makes it a worthy option at this price point. You can expect a respectable and stable frame rate in moderately demanding games.
The Arc A750 also features Xess upscaling technology with some AI touch with it. On paper, this card looks so good. And that can be seen in various games as well. But, it is not consistent, and there are some driver issues as well. TDP is extremely high.
Pros:
- Strong ray tracing and upscaling tech.
- It offers a decent value for money.
Cons:
- The performance is inconsistent, even to the point that some games won't play.
- It requires a large amount of power.
4) AMD Radeon RX 6500 XT
Next, we have the AMD Radeon RX 6500 XT, which brings the AMD’s next-generation features to a low-priced graphic card. You get ray tracing, Smart Access Memory, and FSR. With all these advancements, it can deliver solid performance in the Elden Ring DLC Shadow of Erdtree. However, it is purely intended for gaming at lower resolutions.
Even being available at a price lower than $200, it has high clock speeds compared to its other expensive counterparts. It is also very efficient. That said, the only tradeoff is the memory bandwidth. While the minimum GPU space requirement for Elden Ring DLC Shadow of Erdtree is 3GB, 4GB can potentially cause stuttering in the future.
Pros:
- Decent and consistent gaming performance.
- The energy requirements are low.
Cons:
- It only has 4GB VRAM.
5) Nvidia RTX 3050 6GB
The RTX 3050 6GB is a recent release from Team Green in the budget GPUs segment. With a TDP of just 70W, it doesn't need any external PCI Express power. Like other RTX cards, it has impressive ray tracing, as well as support for DLSS, making it a highly recommended GPU for playing Elden Ring DLC Shadow of Erdtree.
Don’t get confused by its name. It isn't simply the original RTX 3050 8GB model with 2GB of VRAM removed. Instead, there are many significant changes that you might see. There is a 10% decrease in the core count, slow clock speed, and fewer SM units.
That said, you might occasionally see a dip in the FPS counts.
Pros:
- It offers a good performance at lower resolutions.
- It supports DLSS and ray tracing both.
Cons:
- The name is quite misleading.
- You might experience performance dips sometimes.
That concludes our list of the best pocket-friendly GPUs that are more than capable of running the Elden Ring DLC Shadow of Erdtree. You can pick any one that suits you the best.
Check out other articles:
- Elden Ring Steam Deck error: Possible fixes and more explored
- Best Elden Ring DLC Shadow of Erdtree settings on PS5
- Best controller settings for Elden Ring Shadow of the Erdtree