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NVIDIA CMP 30HX

NVIDIA CMP 30HX: Budget GPU for Gaming and Basic Tasks in 2025

Overview of Capabilities, Performance, and Practical Nuances

Introduction

Launched in 2021 as a mining solution for Ethereum, the NVIDIA CMP 30HX has, by 2025, carved out a niche as a budget GPU for gamers and users who do not require peak performance. Despite its initial specialization, this card draws attention due to its affordable price (around $200–220) and compatibility with modern games. But how relevant is it in 2025? Let’s delve into the details.

1. Architecture and Key Features

Architecture: The CMP 30HX is based on the Turing architecture, which was introduced in 2018. This is the same architecture used in the GeForce GTX 16 series, but it lacks support for ray tracing and DLSS.

Manufacturing Process: The 12-nm process from TSMC is considered outdated by 2025 standards, where 5-nm and 4-nm chips dominate the market.

Features:

- No RT or Tensor Cores — Ray tracing and AI algorithms (like DLSS) are not supported.

- CUDA Cores: 1408, similar to the GTX 1660 Super.

- Computational Specialization: Due to its mining focus, some features (like multi-display output) were limited initially; however, 2023-2024 driver updates restored support for multi-monitor setups.

2. Memory: Type, Size, and Performance

Memory Type: GDDR6.

Size: 6 GB — the minimum requirement for gaming at medium settings in 2025.

Bus and Bandwidth: A 192-bit bus provides 336 GB/s. For comparison, the RTX 4060 has a 128-bit bus and 272 GB/s bandwidth, falling short in bandwidth but gaining from architectural improvements.

Impact on Gaming: In high VRAM-demanding projects (e.g., Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty or Starfield), 6 GB might become a bottleneck at ultra settings, but it suffices for 1080p/Medium.

3. Gaming Performance

1080p (Medium/High):

- Apex Legends: 90–110 FPS.

- Fortnite (Epic, without RT): 60–75 FPS.

- Hogwarts Legacy (Medium): 45–55 FPS.

1440p (Low/Medium):

- Call of Duty: Warzone 3: 50–60 FPS.

- Elden Ring: 40–50 FPS.

4K: Not recommended — even at low settings, FPS rarely exceeds 30.

Ray Tracing: Not supported due to the absence of RT cores. In games requiring RT (like Metro Exodus Enhanced Edition), the card is non-functional.

4. Professional Tasks

Video Editing:

- In DaVinci Resolve and Premiere Pro, 1080p video rendering proceeds smoothly, but 4K materials are processed slowly.

- CUDA support accelerates effects, but 6 GB of VRAM limits work on heavy projects.

3D Modeling:

- In Blender and Maya, the CMP 30HX handles simple scenes but struggles with complex tasks (like particle simulation), where it's better to choose the RTX 3050 with 8 GB.

Scientific Calculations:

- CUDA/OpenCL support allows the card to be used for basic machine learning, but due to the small memory capacity, it underperforms compared to even mobile GPUs.

5. Power Consumption and Cooling

TDP: 125 W — a modest figure compatible with most budget power supplies.

Cooling Recommendations:

- A case with 2–3 intake fans.

- The card comes with a single fan—under load, noise levels reach 38 dB.

Temperatures: In gaming, it operates at 70–75°C, with throttling potentially occurring under prolonged load without additional airflow.

6. Comparison with Competitors

NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3050 (8 GB):

- Price: $250.

- Pros: Support for DLSS 3.5, RT cores, +20% performance.

- Cons: Higher price.

AMD Radeon RX 6600 (8 GB):

- Price: $230.

- Pros: Better performance in DX12, FSR 3.0.

- Cons: Weak ray tracing support.

Intel Arc A580 (8 GB):

- Price: $210.

- Pros: Good optimization for new APIs.

- Cons: Unstable drivers.

Conclusion: The CMP 30HX lags behind its competitors in technology but excels in price for those who do not need RT and AI features.

7. Practical Tips

Power Supply: Minimum of 450 W (500 W recommended for headroom).

Compatibility:

- PCIe 3.0 x16 — it works on PCIe 4.0 but without speed benefits.

- Supports Windows 11/Linux, with drivers updated through 2025.

Drivers:

- Use Studio drivers for professional applications.

- Gaming optimizations are limited—new projects may experience “stutters.”

8. Pros and Cons

Pros:

- Low price ($200–220).

- Energy efficiency.

- Adequate for 1080p gaming and basic tasks.

Cons:

- No support for RT and DLSS.

- Only 6 GB of memory.

- Noisy cooling system.

9. Final Conclusion: Who is the CMP 30HX Suitable For?

This card is a choice for:

1. Budget Gamers looking to play on medium settings at Full HD.

2. PC Owners for Office Tasks and Streaming—performance is sufficient for everyday work.

3. Users Upgrading Old Systems—compatible even with motherboards from 2017-2018.

Alternative: If your budget allows an extra $30–50, the RTX 3050 or RX 6600 offer more capabilities. However, if a minimal price is your goal, the CMP 30HX remains a viable option in 2025.

Basic

Label Name

NVIDIA

Platform

Desktop

Launch Date

February 2021

Model Name

CMP 30HX

Generation

Mining GPUs

Base Clock

1530MHz

Boost Clock

1785MHz

Bus Interface

PCIe 3.0 x4

Transistors

6,600 million

TMUs

Texture Mapping Units (TMUs) serve as components of the GPU, which are capable of rotating, scaling, and distorting binary images, and then placing them as textures onto any plane of a given 3D model. This process is called texture mapping.

Foundry

TSMC

Process Size

12 nm

Architecture

Turing

Memory Specifications

Memory Size

6GB

Memory Type

GDDR6

Memory Bus

The memory bus width refers to the number of bits of data that the video memory can transfer within a single clock cycle. The larger the bus width, the greater the amount of data that can be transmitted instantaneously, making it one of the crucial parameters of video memory. The memory bandwidth is calculated as: Memory Bandwidth = Memory Frequency x Memory Bus Width / 8. Therefore, when the memory frequencies are similar, the memory bus width will determine the size of the memory bandwidth.

192bit

Memory Clock

1750MHz

Bandwidth

Memory bandwidth refers to the data transfer rate between the graphics chip and the video memory. It is measured in bytes per second, and the formula to calculate it is: memory bandwidth = working frequency × memory bus width / 8 bits.

336.0 GB/s

Theoretical Performance

Pixel Rate

Pixel fill rate refers to the number of pixels a graphics processing unit (GPU) can render per second, measured in MPixels/s (million pixels per second) or GPixels/s (billion pixels per second). It is the most commonly used metric to evaluate the pixel processing performance of a graphics card.

85.68 GPixel/s

Texture Rate

Texture fill rate refers to the number of texture map elements (texels) that a GPU can map to pixels in a single second.

157.1 GTexel/s

FP16 (half)

An important metric for measuring GPU performance is floating-point computing capability. Half-precision floating-point numbers (16-bit) are used for applications like machine learning, where lower precision is acceptable. Single-precision floating-point numbers (32-bit) are used for common multimedia and graphics processing tasks, while double-precision floating-point numbers (64-bit) are required for scientific computing that demands a wide numeric range and high accuracy.

10.05 TFLOPS

FP64 (double)

An important metric for measuring GPU performance is floating-point computing capability. Double-precision floating-point numbers (64-bit) are required for scientific computing that demands a wide numeric range and high accuracy, while single-precision floating-point numbers (32-bit) are used for common multimedia and graphics processing tasks. Half-precision floating-point numbers (16-bit) are used for applications like machine learning, where lower precision is acceptable.

157.1 GFLOPS

FP32 (float)

An important metric for measuring GPU performance is floating-point computing capability. Single-precision floating-point numbers (32-bit) are used for common multimedia and graphics processing tasks, while double-precision floating-point numbers (64-bit) are required for scientific computing that demands a wide numeric range and high accuracy. Half-precision floating-point numbers (16-bit) are used for applications like machine learning, where lower precision is acceptable.

5.128 TFLOPS

Miscellaneous

SM Count

Multiple Streaming Processors (SPs), along with other resources, form a Streaming Multiprocessor (SM), which is also referred to as a GPU's major core. These additional resources include components such as warp schedulers, registers, and shared memory. The SM can be considered the heart of the GPU, similar to a CPU core, with registers and shared memory being scarce resources within the SM.

Shading Units

The most fundamental processing unit is the Streaming Processor (SP), where specific instructions and tasks are executed. GPUs perform parallel computing, which means multiple SPs work simultaneously to process tasks.

1408

L1 Cache

64 KB (per SM)

L2 Cache

1536KB

TDP

125W

Vulkan Version

Vulkan is a cross-platform graphics and compute API by Khronos Group, offering high performance and low CPU overhead. It lets developers control the GPU directly, reduces rendering overhead, and supports multi-threading and multi-core processors.

1.3

OpenCL Version

3.0

OpenGL

4.6

DirectX

12 (12_1)

CUDA

7.5

Power Connectors

1x 8-pin

Shader Model

6.6

ROPs

The Raster Operations Pipeline (ROPs) is primarily responsible for handling lighting and reflection calculations in games, as well as managing effects like anti-aliasing (AA), high resolution, smoke, and fire. The more demanding the anti-aliasing and lighting effects in a game, the higher the performance requirements for the ROPs; otherwise, it may result in a sharp drop in frame rate.

Suggested PSU

300W

Benchmarks

FP32 (float)

Score

5.128 TFLOPS

OpenCL

Score

57474

Compared to Other GPU

FP32 (float) / TFLOPS

GeForce RTX 3050 Ti Max-Q

5.405 +5.4%

GeForce RTX 3050 Ti Mobile

5.193 +1.3%

CMP 30HX

5.128

Radeon RX 6500M

5.013 -2.2%

GRID M60 2Q

4.922 -4%

OpenCL

Radeon RX 7800M

109617 +90.7%

GeForce RTX 2060

75816 +31.9%

CMP 30HX

57474

Radeon HD 7970

34541 -39.9%

T400

17024 -70.4%