Nvidia GeForce GTX 1060 6GB Review

[jleppard]

What a joke of a review. So Doom running on Vulcan is not a relevant game to bench? You do no justice to consumers by leaving the results of performance out of the benches.

 

[inmyrav]

Do you run these games for a little bit before running the benchmarks? I notice in your R9 390 something I see when I first start up GTA V with my R9 290, the long time between frames occasionally. This occurs when I first start up the game but after a couple of minutes it goes away.

 

[falchard]

Honestly, I can't see the market for this card. Should just skip this generation of nVidia until next year when their architecture can deal with future titles.
For this card, we are in mid-range territory, 1080p or 1440 gamers. If the card can get to 60 fps over 1080p, why bother caring which one is faster when they both play the game fast enough. What matters is how the cards perform below 60 fps and in future titles. Of which there is little notable difference between the 2 cards for DX11 titles, and substantial differences in DX12/Vulkan. The only people buying this card are people on the green team, as the only people who want the RX 480 with stock cooler are on the red team. They make no sense to buy verse OEM versions of the RX 480 in this price range.

 

[inmyrav]

The reason for SLI is a cheaper upgrade in the future.

 

[Mehca]

Lots of people keep saying that Vulcan is some kind of future API that will be widely adopted and this AMD is king and Toms is guilty of Nvidia conspiracy. Oddly enough I remember this exact thing being said about Mantle, yet Mantle didn't see widespread adoption, and didn't improve performance nearly as much as people claimed. Vulkan is basically Mantle 2, and I really don't see it getting widespread adoption either, even with AMD having the market on console hardware.

DX12 is the future, and you can rest assured Nvidia will perform quite on that API, once it actually becomes relevant. The vast majority of games out there are DX11 though, and most games that support DX12 will also support DX11. DX11 is still the most relevant API, and is where Nvidia is rightly investing its support. DX12 optimization will be given through drivers, which Nvidia has a pretty good track record for.

Fanboyism won't change reality.

 

[cdrkf]

Lots of people keep saying that Vulcan is some kind of future API that will be widely adopted and this AMD is king and Toms is guilty of Nvidia conspiracy. Oddly enough I remember this exact thing being said about Mantle, yet Mantle didn't see widespread adoption, and didn't improve performance nearly as much as people claimed. Vulkan is basically Mantle 2, and I really don't see it getting widespread adoption either, even with AMD having the market on console hardware.

DX12 is the future, and you can rest assured Nvidia will perform quite on that API, once it actually becomes relevant. The vast majority of games out there are DX11 though, and most games that support DX12 will also support DX11. DX11 is still the most relevant API, and is where Nvidia is rightly investing its support. DX12 optimization will be given through drivers, which Nvidia has a pretty good track record for.

Fanboyism won't change reality.

Reality is DX12 is heavily based on Mantle- just as Vulkan is.

The main advantage of Vulkan over Mantle is that it does not have the hardware limitations of Mantle- it is not tied to any specific hardware (this is also true for DX12 of course). Where Vulkan has a huge benefit over DX12 however is that it isn't tied to a single software platform. DX12 is Windows 10 ONLY. Vulkan is the successor to OpenGL and is available on Windows 7, 8, 8.1, 10, Linux (all modern distros), MacOS, iOS and android (there are probably more I can't think of right now).

The reason DX always had much higher market share in the past was it was easier to develop for and better supported / documented than OpenGL, and there wasn't really much pressure for cross platform support.

This gen I think Vulkan could be much more relevant for a few reasons:
1: The largest Windows install base is Windows 7, developers cannot address that market if they go DX12 (so currently most DX12 games also include a DX11 render path- however I think longer term a Vulkan based renderer would address all Windows users with one renderer, rather than developers having to support 2).

2: Vulkan and DX12 are much more similar than DX11 and OpenGL- as they share a common base platform so moving over to Vulkan shouldn't pose the same difficulties as going from DX -> OpenGl did.

3: The wide compatibility with other software platforms as noted above

4: The fact that there are some serious hitters in the industry who are pushing for games to come to Linux as a platform (specifically Valve and Steam OS). There have already been a number of high profile OpenGL ports done to bring big titles to SteamOS, Vulkan should make that process much easier longer term, and won't result in giving up on performance if the new DOOM is any indication (although it is worth noting that ID have always developed for OpenGL and are probably the best in the industry at it so DOOM is probably the very best performance we can expect).

The lack of adoption is mainly down to the fact that Vulkan was only just released whilst DX12 has had some time on the market. It will be interesting to see where things go.

I think the key thing to remember though is *even if* developers move over to Vulkan instead of DX12, the two APIs offer essentially the same improvements in terms of performance and better hardware utilization. The thing is though if you look at the overall picture one of two things happens with either- games either perform effectively the same under DX11 and DX12 *or* AMD gain more from the switch than nVidia do. I've yet to see a title where nVidia gains more FPS than AMD, and I think that is simply down to the fact AMD have dedicated hardware built into their gpu's that nVidia don't. That said- as nVidia are generally ahead in DX11 performance (for a given performance bracket of card), what this is doing for the most part is *leveling the playing field* between the two. The reason this is exciting on AMD cards is because of the weakness in DX11 the cards are priced lower than they probably should be- so they currently represent a good deal. I mean nvidia cards can run DX12 and Vulkan titles just fine, they aren't losing performance.

What I do think is that in light of this, nVidia will probably have to adjust prices down (and AMD will likely nudge prices up) as DX12 / Vulkan become more common. I don't believe nVidia can get the kind of gains AMD can purely though drivers as they are fighting hardware with software tweaks (nVidia are adding in hardware async with Volta in 2018). I mean based on theoretical performance the R9 Fury is a much more powerful card than a GTX 980, yet in DX11 they are roughly on par. In DX12 / Vulkan we are seeing the Fury positioned above the 980- where it frankly should be, whilst more powerful nVidia cards like the 1070 are sitting above it.

 

[TJ Hooker]

Reality is DX12 is heavily based on Mantle- just as Vulkan is.

Do you have a source for this? I don't remember reading anything about DX12 being based on Mantle.

 

[Myrmidonas]

Reality is DX12 is heavily based on Mantle- just as Vulkan is.

Do you have a source for this? I don't remember reading anything about DX12 being based on Mantle.

".....According to Huddy, AMD has taken Mantle to both Microsoft and the Khronos to help them realize and work in any of Mantle’s benefits that they may wish to implement in their own next generation APIs. Thankfully this resulted in Microsoft and Khronos borrowing many aspects of the low level API that should hopefully bare fruit once DX12 and OpenGL NG finally come to market....."

http://

 

[Lavacon]

Bench with gameworks titles much? This was a very sad & bias review. I expect better from such a long standing resource.

 

[Braindead154]

I'm perplexed why, when speaking about "budget" cards, the fact that a G-Sync monitor will run you an extra 50 - 200 dollars over a FreeSync monitor. This has to be part of the equation for buyers. If I'm doing a budget build, the 480 build is a solid 150-250 dollars cheaper than a 1060/G-Sync build.

 

[harly2]

Toms...always the worst. Looks like you are less popular than ever though. Watch and learn. https://youtu.be/V54W4p1mCu4

 

[Michael_Nord]

This review doesnt answer anything to me, just want an neutral review ,this is more like a commercial for buing gtx 1060 :-(

 

[jasonelmore]

Toms your 1060 numbers look really low. You have the 980 beating the 1060 in Rise of Tomb Raider, and Ashes of the Singularity and virtually every other game test. But on other review sites, the 1060 is slightly faster than the 980 in almost all tests. See Guru3d

 

[rhysiam]

Lots of people keep saying that Vulcan is some kind of future API that will be widely adopted and this AMD is king and Toms is guilty of Nvidia conspiracy. Oddly enough I remember this exact thing being said about Mantle, yet Mantle didn't see widespread adoption, and didn't improve performance nearly as much as people claimed. Vulkan is basically Mantle 2, and I really don't see it getting widespread adoption either, even with AMD having the market on console hardware.

DX12 is the future, and you can rest assured Nvidia will perform quite on that API, once it actually becomes relevant. The vast majority of games out there are DX11 though, and most games that support DX12 will also support DX11. DX11 is still the most relevant API, and is where Nvidia is rightly investing its support. DX12 optimization will be given through drivers, which Nvidia has a pretty good track record for.

Fanboyism won't change reality.

The problem with your argument is that DX12 (like Vulkan/Mantle and Apple's Metal) is fundamentally designed from the ground up to minimise driver overhead and communicate as close as possible to "bare metal" hardware. That means that DX12 games have far, far fewer avenues for driver optimisation when compared to DX11.

While most would agree that AMD GPUs tend to do better in DX12 and Vulkan titles, IMHO it's more accurate to say that poor DX11 driver optimisation means that AMD cards under-perform in many/most DX11 titles. That's also why for years we've been see AMD cards improve over time, as AMD gradually implement driver optimisations to eek more out of their hardware. The issue for AMD, I believe, is that Nvidia has generally been able to get those optimisations in place early.

What we're seeing in Vulkan and DX12 benchmarks is AMD cards being run without the shackles of DX11 drivers. Unless Nvidia can convince game devs - who now bear the bulk of the burden for GPU optimisations - to better utilise Nvidia hardware over AMD, it's not a picture that's likely to change much over time or driver releases.

**edit - I should add that I agree with you that right now DX11 is certainly still the dominant player and certainly at the moment, the 1060 is significantly ahead in that regard.

 

[leeb2013]

Shame about sli, illI'll probably get the rx 480 and cross fire instead

 

[Francis_10]

ETA on CAD performance?

 

[Samer1970]

Toms your 1060 numbers look really low. You have the 980 beating the 1060 in Rise of Tomb Raider, and Ashes of the Singularity and virtually every other game test. But on other review sites, the 1060 is slightly faster than the 980 in almost all tests. See Guru3d

hmmm .. Paid by Nvidia reviews ???

 

[cryoburner]

>advertised as 120watt max but gets 130+ under stressed.
>no SLI bridge
>$250 for 3gb and 300 for the 6.
>not exactly better than RX480 or even the 980, more like comparable in performance
>small OC headroom, well RX 480 OC headroom was near non-existent too.

Any AIB's RX480 are much better value than this.
*reads AIB's 1060, 480 still much better value

...realizes people would still buy this.

Where did you get this from? The tests here clearly showed the 1060 staying right around 120 watts of sustained power draw under load, even under conditions you would not likely run into during actual gaming. At the resolutions the card will be mostly used at, 1080p and 1440p, the tested draw was 90 and 110 watts respectively. Let me guess, you must be looking at the admittedly confusing "frames per second" graph, in which the card is pushing 130+ FPS starting at 60 watts, while the RX 480 only manages that performance at 140 watts. : P

And no, the $250 cards are not 3GB. All the $250 cards have 6GB of memory, with models priced higher potentially offering better cooling solutions and higher factory overclocks. The "Founders Edition" card here is indeed overpriced for what you get, but so are those "Collectors Edition" games where people pay extra for useless trinkets. This is likely targeted at a similar audience of people who are more interested in bragging about their new card than actually getting the most out of it. If 3GB cards are eventually released, they would most likely be priced closer to the RX 480's 4GB model.

When you consider that the starting price of the 8GB RX 480 is only $10 less than the 1060, which in most cases offers better performance, the price of the 1060 seems very reasonable. Perhaps more important would be to add in power costs though. If you leave your PC on 24/7, the significantly lower idle power draw alone will save you around $8 worth of electricity over the course of a year, based on the average residential cost of electricity in the US. Even if you power your computer down at night, once you add in gaming for a few hours a day, you could easily be looking at the RX 480 costing an extra $10+ more in electricity per year. That could really add up over the life of the card, making it actually cost more over time. Plus, of course, the greatly reduced power consumption of the 1060 will result in less waste heat and quieter operation when using an equivalent cooler.

While I've always gone with Radeon cards in the past, they've clearly been well behind Nvidia in terms of efficiency in recent years, and I'm probably much more likely to get a GTX 1060 than a RX 480 for my next computer build. That won't be for some months though, so perhaps prices will settle or a more attractive card will come out around this price/performance segment in the mean time.

The only thing I'm a little disappointed to see is that the GTX 1060 is not quite a GTX 980-killer, at least in terms of raw performance. It often performs close to a 980, but in many cases is closer to a 970. I suppose that was never the intention though, and it's clearly positioned as something in between the two. It's possible that driver updates and future game optimizations might give the 1060 a nudge closer to the 980's performance though.

 

[n0ns3ns3]

the true AIB RX 480 are 250 and up

 

[cdrkf]

the true AIB RX 480 are 250 and up

Prices will sort themselves out imo- although if your on a budget I don't really see why you'd bother with an 8gb RX480 over the cheaper 4gb version? The performance is effectively the same and bar 2 games (with some deliberately silly custom graphics settings) I can't think of any games that really need more than 4gb at 1080p. Even the couple that do you're talking going from 'mega extreme experimental mode' down to 'ultra' settings to avoid that being a problem.

To put it another way, whilst games moving forward may have options that need more than 4gb of vram, I think we're a LONG way off before the minimum required to play a game is more than 4gb, especially as both companies have 2gb cards on the market....

 

[n0ns3ns3]

the true AIB RX 480 are 250 and up

Prices will sort themselves out imo- although if your on a budget I don't really see why you'd bother with an 8gb RX480 over the cheaper 4gb version? The performance is effectively the same and bar 2 games (with some deliberately silly custom graphics settings) I can't think of any games that really need more than 4gb at 1080p. Even the couple that do you're talking going from 'mega extreme experimental mode' down to 'ultra' settings to avoid that being a problem.

To put it another way, whilst games moving forward may have options that need more than 4gb of vram, I think we're a LONG way off before the minimum required to play a game is more than 4gb, especially as both companies have 2gb cards on the market....

I see no point to spend 200+ $ to lower settings from max on 1080p
Same way you can use 750ti with lower settings

 

[cdrkf]

the true AIB RX 480 are 250 and up

Prices will sort themselves out imo- although if your on a budget I don't really see why you'd bother with an 8gb RX480 over the cheaper 4gb version? The performance is effectively the same and bar 2 games (with some deliberately silly custom graphics settings) I can't think of any games that really need more than 4gb at 1080p. Even the couple that do you're talking going from 'mega extreme experimental mode' down to 'ultra' settings to avoid that being a problem.

To put it another way, whilst games moving forward may have options that need more than 4gb of vram, I think we're a LONG way off before the minimum required to play a game is more than 4gb, especially as both companies have 2gb cards on the market....

I see no point to spend 200+ $ to lower settings from max on 1080p
Same way you can use 750ti with lower settings

Lol... I don't think you would have to 'lower settings from max' on all but, 2 games maybe? Also the point of the 4gb RX480- it doesn't cost over $200

I guess I come from the perspective that I have *never* spent that much on a graphics card (most I've spent is £160, which is close to $200 depending on exchange rate). I view the 8gb RX480 as too expensive, same goes for the GTX 1060, though I'm certain they'll both come down in due course. That said looking at the most recent announcements and prices, the 4gb RX 470 is probably the card I'd be looking for (although I guess there's little point for me right now, I have an R9 280 which is ample for everything I play so I'll likely not upgrade the gpu this gen).

 

[littleleo]

the true AIB RX 480 are 250 and up

Prices will sort themselves out imo- although if your on a budget I don't really see why you'd bother with an 8gb RX480 over the cheaper 4gb version? The performance is effectively the same and bar 2 games (with some deliberately silly custom graphics settings) I can't think of any games that really need more than 4gb at 1080p. Even the couple that do you're talking going from 'mega extreme experimental mode' down to 'ultra' settings to avoid that being a problem.

To put it another way, whilst games moving forward may have options that need more than 4gb of vram, I think we're a LONG way off before the minimum required to play a game is more than 4gb, especially as both companies have 2gb cards on the market....

Yeah, and I remember getting a 20 MB hard drive back in the day and thinking I'll never use that much storage. I also remember shopping around for the best video card and buying a Diamond SpeedStar 24X model only to see the Diamond Stealth model released a couple of weeks later with double the VRAM. So saying you don't see needing more than 4GBs VRAM for gaming for a long time to come may be a little short sighted.

 

[masterofevil22]

This video is focused on VALUE, but covers basically everything between the GTX 1060 & RX 480

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IN4NqPaFM_8&feature=gp-n-y&google_comment_id=z13yflkhnqbmj5lz204celi54o2wcpqozak

 

[gasolin]

my evga gtx 960 ssc 4gb can handle need for speed SHIFT 2 unleashed in 3440x1440 with 55-60 fps at medium settings, gtx 1060 is about the same speed as a gtx 980, alot faster then a gtx 960 and would handel 2560x1440 at medium graphic settings or a bit higher fine, if it's not a game like crysis 2-3