At first we would like to thank KFA2 for offering us a sample of their GeForce GTX 1050 OC 2GB Video Card for testing and reviewing.

 

 

 

About KFA2:

 

“Born from over 16 years of manufacturing gaming performance products.

 

From what was “Galaxytech” and its European brand “KFA2”, we now bring you an updated brand, making it possible to offer our worldwide customer base the exact same product portfolio, service and consumer awareness.

 

Founded in 1994, GALAXY has built its reputation as the behind-the-scenes designer and manufacturer of many of the most popular OEM-branded graphic card products on the market.

 

We are dedicated to creating a custom user experience and believe that each of our products needs to fit its owner, not the other way around. What we make is not merely the product of focus group tests, but rather the results of observing and honoring the way individuals choose to interact with technology.

 

Since 2000 we have introduced numerous critically-acclaimed product series, "Hall of Fame" The aim of HOF is simple: To make a series of graphics cards with the best components available that is able to enter the 3DMark Hall Of Fame.

 

Our aim is to produce performance products that help to enhance the escapist in games, to heighten the perception of play and help contribute a performance level that is unsurpassed.”

 

Product Features:

 

Fan – large 90mm fan for better cooling performance

Effective Cooling Design – Aluminum heatsink with direct GPU cooling

No 6-pin – suitable for most PSUs; low power consumption

All Digital Interface – DP 1.4, HDMI 2.0b, DVI-D

 

Product Specifications:

After trying out the low-end VGA card segment comprised of the RX460 from AMD, it is now the time to look what Nvidia brings up to the table and to be more exact the GeForce GTX 1050. The GPU does come with a GP107-300 Pascal architecture that does pack 640 shader units (five SMs), 40 texture mapping units and 32 ROPs. The fabrication process for these chips is 14nm, unlike the GTX 1060, GTX 1070 or GTX 1080 which are on 16nm TSMC and one of the benefits for these budget-friendly cards is low power consumption. It is believed that these GPUs are manufactured in Samsung fabs.

 

The card packs 2GB of GDDR5 memory buffer, while the bus width is 128-bit.

 

KFA2 is again proposing a pre-overclocked card from the factory; this means that the GPU clock has been increased from the NVIDIA’s specs of 1354MHz to 1367MHz, while the RAM clocks did remain at the same levels.

 

Even if we are discussing about a budget-friendly video card, KFA2 does not seem to make compromises and we get the same quality as we have been used to with their other products. The GTX 1050 OC video card is shipped inside a medium-sized cardboard enclosure, which specifies some of the main highlights and supported technologies:

 

 

 

 

On the box sides, we will be able to check a complete list of GPU features, along with the minimum system requirements along with the box contents (which is not complete, inside the enclosure there is not only the video card present):

 

 

 

Even more information about the product can be found on the back side:

 

 

 

After removing the top layer of the packaging, we will end up with an all-black box:

 

 

 

Inside the box, we will find a lot of protective foam, so the card will be shipped unharmed; also here we will get to see the documentation, along with the installation disk:

 

 

 

 

The installation guide is standard and can be applied for any other video card:

 

 

 

Besides the previously mentioned foam, the card is also wrapped inside an anti-static bag:

 

 

 

KFA2 GTX 1050 OC is quite small, sporting the dimensions of 196*126*39mm and comes with a single 90mm silent fan cooling solution. The top black shroud is made of plastic and in some areas it does imitate black screws, while the 9-blade fan is surprisingly quiet while keeping the GPU temperature low even in most stressful conditions:

 

 

 

Some shots from the sides of the card do show how the shroud along with the underneath aluminum heatsink fit together:

 

 

 

 

 

On the back side of the PCB, we can spot several stickers, but also six spring-loaded screws which keep the cooling system in place; if it happens you need to remove the cooling system for maintenance, make sure to remove all the screws, not only the ones around the GPU because the VRM cooling is linked to the main heatsink:

 

 

 

As we have seen with other high-end boards, measuring points are also available here:

 

 

 

On the I/O we will be able to spot a ventilation grill, along with the DisplayPort 1.4 port, HDMI 2.0b but also one DVI-D:

 

 

 

The card PCB design is very clean, with the VRM present on the left side, the GPU in the middle along with the surrounding GDDR5 memory ICs in a number of four:

 

 

 

Between the I/O shield and the PCI-Express x16 connector, we will find the fan header:

 

 

 

The VRM is present in a 2+1 configuration:

 

 

 

KFA2 went with Samsung K4G41325FE-HC28 ICs on this board, which are rated to operate at 1750MHz:

 

 

 

Here is also a closer look at the GP107 GPU, manufactured on the 14nm technology:

 

 

 

The top right corner of the PCB makes available the measuring points, but also here we will find some place holders for additional headers, which tells us that the PCB was designed to fit with other GPUs too (1050Ti maybe?):

 

 

 

AS we have noted before, the cooling system of the GPU and VRM are unified and it does not make physical contact with the memory chips:

 

 

 

Here is the KFA2 GTX 1050 OC along with the single-slot HIS RX460 2GB, a photo that shows that they are in about the same league in terms of PCB size:

 

 

 

Test Setup

 

CPU: Intel I5 4690K Retail @ 4.6GHz

CPU Cooler: Corsair H100i GTX

Motherboard: BIOSTAR Z97X Gaming

RAM: GeIL Black Dragon 4x4GB DDR2133 (@1600)

Video: Currently reviewed card

Power Supply: Cooler Master 850W

SSD: OCZ Vertex 3 240GB + OCZ Vertex 460

Case: Cooler Master ATCS 840

 

With the help of the GPU-Z utility, we could extract lots of information regarding the video card clocks,memory type, pixel and texture fill rate and so on:

 

 

To receive more in-depth information regarding the GPU, we have used the AIDA64 utility:

 

 

 

 

Temperature tests:

For finding out the temperatures in both IDLE and Full Load with the fan set on Auto, we left the computer IDLE for about 25 minutes and then started monitoring with HWINFO64 and logged the values obtained while running Heaven 4.0 at the 1920x1080 resolution for an additional 20 minutes, with details at Maximum and Tesselation set to Extreme. During this time, the ambient temperature was held steady at 17.8 degrees Celsius:

 

 

 

Noise measurements

Before measuring out the noise the video card was producing, we have first measured the noise inside the room the tests took place and we found out it was 29.2 dBA (with everything turned off).

At all times, the sound meter was placed 20cm near the video card.

The GPU fan was controlled by the latest version of the MSI Afterburner utility; since the fan is connected to the header with only two wires, RPM monitoring is not possible:

 

 

 

 

3DMark 11

 

3DMark 11 is a DirectX 11 video card benchmark test for measuring your PC's gaming performance. 3DMark 11 makes extensive use of DirectX 11 features including tessellation, compute shaders and multi-threading. Trusted by gamers worldwide to give accurate and unbiased results, 3DMark 11 consistently and reliably tests your PC's DirectX 11 performance under game-like loads.

 

 

3DMark 2013

 

3DMark includes everything you need to benchmark your hardware in one app. Whether you're gaming on a smart phone, tablet, notebook, laptop, desktop, or a high performance gaming PC, 3DMark includes a benchmark designed specifically for your type of device. And it's not just for Windows. You can compare your scores with Android and iOS devices too. It's the best 3DMark we've ever created.

 

 

Unigine Heaven 4.0

 

Heaven Benchmark with its current version 4.0 is a GPU-intensive benchmark that hammers graphics cards to the limits. This powerful tool can be effectively used to determine the stability of a GPU under extremely stressful conditions, as well as check the cooling system's potential under maximum heat output. It provides completely unbiased results and generates true in-game rendering workloads across all platforms, such as Windows, Linux and Mac OS X.

 

 

Hitman Absolution

 

Hitman: Absolution is a stealth video game developed by IO Interactive and published by Square Enix. It is the fifth installment in the Hitman game series, and runs on IO Interactive's proprietary Glacier 2 game engine.

 

 

DIRT: Rally

 

Dirt Rally is a racing video game developed and published by Codemasters for Microsoft Windows. An early access version of the game was released on 27 April 2015, via digital distribution service Steam.

 

 

Sleeping Dogs

 

Sleeping Dogs is a 2012 open world action-adventure video game developed by United Front Games and Square Enix London. It was published by Square Enix and Bandai Namco Games for Microsoft Windows and the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 consoles.

 

 

Tomb Raider

 

Tomb Raider is a media franchise that began as a video game series and includes comic books, novels, theme park rides, and movies, centering around the adventures of the British archaeologist Lara Croft.

 

 

Sniper Elite III

 

Sniper Elite III is a tactical shooter video game developed by Rebellion Developments and published by 505 Games for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Xbox 360 and Xbox One.

 

 

Metro Last Light

 

Metro: Last Light is a single-player post-apocalyptic-themed first-person shooter video game with stealth and survival horror elements, developed by Ukrainian studio 4A Games and published by Deep Silver.

 

 

Bioshock Infinite

 

BioShock Infinite is a first-person shooter video game developed by Irrational Games and published by 2K Games.

 

 

Crysis 2

 

Crysis 2 is a first-person shooter video game developed by Crytek, published by Electronic Arts and released in North America, Australia and Europe in March 2011 for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360.

 

 

Batman Arhkam Origins

 

Batman: Arkham Origins is a 2013 action-adventure video game developed by Warner Bros. Games Montréal and released by Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment for Microsoft Windows and the PlayStation 3, Wii U and Xbox 360 video game consoles.

 

 

Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor

 

Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor is an open world action-adventure video game set within Tolkien's legendarium, developed by Monolith Productions and published by Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment.

 

 

Alien: Isolation

 

Alien: Isolation is a first-person survival horror stealth video game developed by The Creative Assembly and published by Sega.

 

 

GRID Autosport

 

Grid Autosport is a racing video game released by Codemasters for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 on 24 June 2014 in North America and 27 June 2014 in Europe.

 

 

Rise of the Tomb Raider

 

Rise of the Tomb Raider was officially announced in June 2014. The game's storyline follows Lara Croft as she ventures into Siberia in search of the legendary city of Kitezh, whilst battling a paramilitary organization that intends on beating her to the city's promise of immortality. Presented from a third-person perspective, the game primarily focuses on survival and combat, while the player may also explore its landscape and various optional tombs.

 

 

 

Hitman

 

Hitman is an episodic action-adventure stealth video game developed by IO Interactive and published by Square Enix for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One. It is the sixth entry in the Hitman series. While the game's prologue acts as a prequel to the series, the main game takes place 7 years after the events of Hitman: Absolution.

 

 

 

Deus Ex: Mankind Divided

 

Deus Ex: Mankind Divided is a cyberpunk-themed action role-playing stealth video game developed by Eidos Montreal and published by Square Enix. Set two years after Human Revolution, Mankind Divided features the return of Adam Jensen from the previous game, Deus Ex: Human Revolution, with new technology and body augmentations.

 

 

 

Gears of War 4

 

Gears of War 4 is a third-person shooter video game developed by The Coalition and published by Microsoft Studios for Microsoft Windows and Xbox One. It is the fourth main installment in the Gears of War series, and the first entry not to be developed by Epic Games.

 

 

 

3DMark: Time Spy

 

Time Spy is a new DirectX 12 benchmark test, coming soon to all Windows editions of 3DMark. With its pure DirectX 12 engine, built from the ground up to support new features like asynchronous compute, explicit multi-adapter, and multi-threading, Time Spy is an ideal benchmark for testing the DirectX 12 performance of the latest graphics cards.

 

Developed with input from AMD, Intel, Microsoft, NVIDIA, and the other members of the Futuremark Benchmark Development Program, Time Spy shows the exciting potential of low-level, low-overhead APIs like DirectX 12.

 

 

 

 

The GeForce GTX 1050 implementation from KFA2 provides a small overclock from the factory, a dual-slot cooling system that can keep the GPU at low temperatures even during long gaming sessions and no less than three video outputs. The card lacks fancy stuff such as LED-lighted fans or logos as we have seen on more expensive card models and does not require extra power from a separate PCI-Express PSU connector. GTX 1050 represents a light version of the 1050Ti (with one SM disabled) and only 2GB RAM but still succeeds to hold its own in games such as Dirt Rally, Tomb Raider 2013, Bioshock Infinite, Batman Arhkam Origins and more, with the details set to high and at a resolution of 1920z1080.

 

The next step was to attempt overclocking and see if we hit a wall quickly, considering that no extra power is fed to the board; to our surprise, we could raise the GPU clock from 1367MHz to 1580MHz, while the memory overclocking was a little “shy” with a smaller increase from, 1752MHz to 1792MHz. While at stock we have obtained about 6047 points in Fire Strike, while overclocked we were able to climb to 6407.

 

 

(click to enlarge)

 

This card is definitely not recommended for VR gaming, but just for kicks we have attempted to run the SteamVR Performance test. The card was able to produce a score of 2.4, which is an impressive score increase versus the RX460.

 

 

 

The KFA2 GTX 1050 OC 2GB video card can be found online for about 118.5 Euros, which means that it does “play” in the same price range as the RX460. Considering the performance difference between the two, we will say that the KFA2 version of the GTX 1050 is definitely a better deal.

 

KFA2 GeForce GTX 1050 OC 2GB Video Card is Recommended for:

 

 

 

We would like to thank again to KFA2 for making this review possible!