Should I buy a 1060 or a 1050 ti?

[Avacadoee]

Should I get a 1050 ti Super SuperClocked 4Gb that I can overclock even more or should I get a Asus Oc 1060 3Gb, that I can maybe overclock, (haven't looked into it) for about $30-40 more? The CPU is going to be an i5 2400 for about $42. (Really worth the money Imo)

Asus Oc Dual Fan 3Gb 1806 Core Clock: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01KMVHB6M/ref=twister_B01KJGWHIM?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1

Evga Ssc 4Gb 1336 Core Clock:
https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?item=N82E16814487292

 

[elbert]

Often times the 1060 3GB falls below the 1050ti performance. The 3GB's may be the issue so get a 1050ti or a 1060 6GB.
PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

Video Card: EVGA - GeForce GTX 1060 6GB 6GB GAMING Video Card ($227.98 @ Newegg)
Total: $227.98
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2017-06-10 13:31 EDT-0400

 

[Solandri]

Often times the 1060 3GB falls below the 1050ti performance. The 3GB's may be the issue so get a 1050ti or a 1060 6GB.

I find that very hard to believe. Here are the specs for the 1050 Ti vs 1060.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Nvidia_graphics_processing_units#GeForce_10_series

The 3 GB 1060 has

• 
  ■ 50% more shaders, texture units, and render units
  ■17% faster base clock speed, 5% faster boost clock speed
  ■29% faster memory clock speed
  ■71% more memory bandwidth
  ■a 192 bit memory bus vs 128 bit for the 1050
  ■75% faster pixel fill rate
  ■75% faster texture fill rate

The only way I could see it being slower than the 1050Ti is if you managed to fill up all of the 3GB VRAM, causing it to wait while it transferred textures from system memory (or even disk) to VRAM. But with 3GB VRAM that should only be an issue if you're playing in 4k resolution with ultra textures. You're not gonna be playing 4k games with a 1050 or 1060. It will only happen in the most demanding games played at 1080p and high textures, but is trivially solved by lowering the texture size one notch.

Also note that the 6 GB 1060 uses a core with different configuration than the 3 GB 1060, and is faster yet. If it's not priced that much higher, the 6 GB version is preferable to the 3 GB version even without taking into account the VRAM difference.

 

[elbert]

Try 1080p causing it to fill the 3GB's. Get a 4 or 6GB video card at the very least.

A number of games even see near the same performance. A 1060 3GB should match a rx470 at the very minimum.

 

[dontlistentome]

I'd get the 1060 3gb, it's a faster card. Especially since you're pairing it with an i5 2400. Any strange scenario where the 1gb vram more on the 1050 Ti helps will undoubtedly depend on using the fastest CPU. A Sandy Bridge can get you great framerate with the 1060 3gb with settings that you'll actually use.

 

[Solandri]

Try 1080p causing it to fill the 3GB's. Get a 4 or 6GB video card at the very least.

This is one of the drawbacks of running benchmarks with canned "Ultra" vs "Very high" vs "High" settings. There's pretty much no point running 1080p games with ultra textures. High textures are 1024x1024. Ultra textures are 2048x2048. You can't even fit an ultra texture on a 1080p monitor. The only time an ultra texture makes sense in 1080p is if it's an environmental texture of a large object and your character runs up really close to it (e.g. to look closely at part of a poster on a wall). And if you're busy doing stuff like that, you don't really care about framerate.

Like I said, if you get a 3GB card and start running into slowdowns because of using up all your VRAM, just drop down the textures one notch. The textures take 4x as much VRAM for each notch you increase the texture quality. So it's trivial to keep VRAM use below the max by reducing texture quality. All your other settings can stay on whatever "Ultra" means.

That said, the 3GB and 6GB 1060 are not the same card with different amounts of VRAM. The 6GB version has a more capable core. If it's not priced much higher, it's worth getting the 6GB version over the 3GB version even ignoring the amount of VRAM.

 

[elbert]

Its not about just fitting a texture. Textures arent one simple image anymore. You have bump maps the same size woven in which are the same image produced in a surface normal to create lighting caculations. Old CSGO maps are already using 1024 X 1024 with the bump maps. I have created a good number to go into my own maps. A 3GB mid range card isnt going to cut it very long. I would get the 1050ti as its more future proof.