Nvidia GeForce GTX 1060 review
Nvidia’s latest Pascal graphics card, the GTX 1060, has launched in a Blaise of glory, knocking the RX 480 off its mainstream perch and giving a swift shoeing to the GTX 980 on the way past.
AMD’s competing card is their first Polaris-based GPU. Check out our full review of the AMD RX 480.
The Nvidia GTX 1060 is the first mainstream Pascal-powered card to come out of the GeForce stable, and features a brand new GPU sporting all the architectural goodness which made the GTX 1080 such a desirable pixel pusher.
Nvidia is claiming gaming performance on par with last generation’s GTX 980 and, arriving with a $249 (£239) base price point, the new GTX 1060 could be the mainstream card of our dreams. But can those claims match up to the truth and how does it fare against the similarly-priced AMD alternative, the RX 480?
The answers are: yes and uh-oh, AMD.
If you're an impatient sort, click below to be taken directly to architecture info, our benchmark data, and that all-important out-of-10 score:
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Nvidia GTX 1060 architecture
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Nvidia GTX 1060 benchmarks
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Nvidia GTX 1060 performance
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Nvidia GTX 1060 verdict
Nvidia GTX 1060 specs
Nvidia and AMD have taken opposing tacks with their newest graphics card releases. Nvidia have stuck with their traditional approach, launching essentially their range-topping card, the GTX 1080, closely followed by the slightly cut-down GTX 1070, straight out of the gate. AMD though have come in at the other end, aiming to nail down the volume graphics card segment before going after the higher-margin, high-end GPU arena.
Their plan was to release a well-priced card, with decent performance, to capture the hearts and minds of the mainstream upgrade crowd. And that’s what they’ve done with the AMD RX 480; a card with impressive mid-range gaming performance at a price that isn’t going leave your wallet weeping.
That in turn seems to have either forced Nvidia’s hand, making them release their competing GTX 1060 earlier than planned, or they may have simply been lying in wait to see what AMD was able to achieve with the RX 480, happy to spoil the party soon after release. Either way, Nvidia’s GTX 1060 is here to make trouble for the AMD RX 480 by clawing back the mainstream audience with the twin pillars of higher performance and lower power.
The headline specs see the new GP106 GPU in the GTX 1060 delivering half the CUDA cores of the GTX 1080 on the same 16nm FinFET production process, with all the performance and efficiency enhancements that smaller lithography creates. And that extra efficiency means this speedy little graphics card is capable of producing the gaming goods with a TDP of just 120W.
This initial release is also sporting a healthy 6GB of GDDR5 memory, running at 8,000MHz. I say ‘initial release’ because there is still some confusion as to whether Nvidia is going to release a half-pint version of the GTX 1060 down the line with just 3GB of video memory. Personally I don’t really think it’s worth their while to release a modern $200+ card with less than 4GB of VRAM, but we’ve heard from Nvidia’s board partners that those are the plans, potentially for August. Though plans are wont to change…
In terms of 6GB pricing we’re looking at another Founders Edition situation. This Pascal reference card has again been rebadged as a ‘Founders Edition’ with a blower cooler which is just about up to the job. And it will cost you $299 (£279) for the privilege. You’ll only be able to buy this edition from Nvidia’s own online store, but as this is more of a mainstream offering their partners will have cards available at retail on day one. And even the stock-clocked variants are liable to appear with better cooling. We've been testing the seriously overclocked, and overclockable, MSI GTX 1060 Gaming X 6G. It's a great platform for the overclockers looking to push their GPU further, but we're really keen to see what stock-clocked versions will be like for a more reasonable price.
MSI have extended the PCB to allow for extra cooling and space for improved power components, but board partners will also be able to create mini-ITX versions of the card too as the reference PCB is shorter even than that of the RX 480. Zotac have already announced a micro version which will be the darling of the small form factor crowd, especially if, as they reckon, it will match Nvidia’s base MSRP for the GTX 1060.
That MSRP for the custom cards starts at $249 (£239), though it’s unlikely we’ll see many other models batting that low for a good long while. Especially if demand outstrips supply as it has done with the previous Pascal launches this year. There are though already cards available, with existing stock, at the $250 (£250) price point, so things are looking pretty good on that front.
Nvidia GTX 1060 architecture
The GTX 1060 rocks a new graphics core based on Nvidia’s Pascal GPU architecture. Where the GTX 1080 and GTX 1070 use the GP104 chip, the new GTX 1060 uses a smaller, cut-down GP106 design. The GP106 has roughly half the graphics logic of its big brother, almost split straight down the middle, but is only physically a little smaller because it houses more than 60% of the transistors the GP104 contains.
It’s using the same 16nm FinFET lithography as the other Pascal cards, as well as the same architectural design fitting 128 CUDA cores into each streaming microprocessor (SM). The full GP106 core has ten of these Pascal SMs inside, making up a total of 1,280 CUDA cores. While that means it’s got half the cores of the GTX 1080 and half the texture units, because the aggregated memory bus hasn’t been halved (it’s 192-bit against the GTX 1080’s 256-bit bus) the GP106 retains an impressive 48 render output units (ROPs).
We will see a cut-down version of the GP106 core making up the GTX 1050 which we expect to see arriving later on this year. That chip will probably come with just eight SMs for a total of 1,024 CUDA cores and a chunk less video memory. Maybe just 3GB, though that might sound familiar to some…
If we take the GTX 1060 as the generational successor to the GTX 960 - last gen’s 120W mainstream card - then the architectural improvements are massive. The GTX 960’s GM206 chip has 1,024 CUDA cores inside it and uses the 28nm process to stuff 2.94billion transistors into its package. The GP106 GPU though has 4.4billion transistors, with more cores and more logic in a much smaller die size. And in terms of performance it’s almost twice as quick.
Realistically though that’s not a fair comparison. The GTX 960 traditionally retailed around $200 (£160), while the GTX 1060 comes in at a much higher price point. In terms of generational parity I’d say the pricier GTX 970 is the card that makes for a better comparison. Except the GTX 1060 trounces that in performance terms too. On that count then it’s the GTX 980 which the newest Pascal card has in its sights and that makes it quite the big game hunter.
At the time of its launch the GTX 980 was the top card of the Maxwell generation and has remained a $450 - $500 part for most of its life. It’s also rocking far more CUDA cores - 768 to be precise - more texture units, more ROPs and a wider memory bus too. And in terms of the GPU head-to-head the GP106 is around half the physical size of the GM204 yet only a little shy of its 5.2billion transistors.
Still the Pascal architecture in the GP106 is able to keep up.
Nvidia GTX 1060 benchmarks
Nvidia GTX 1060 performance
They’ve only gone and done it. In the GTX 1060 Nvidia have created a card capable of matching the GTX 980 for around half the price and with a GPU that’s half the size. If that doesn’t convince you of the gaming benefits of matching an efficient graphics architecture with a new, smaller production process, nothing will.
And when you take into account the AMD RX 480 is only just beating the GTX 970 that should tell you where the impressive GTX 1060 stands in the mainstream red vs. green GPU battle royale. Across our DirectX 11 benchmark suite the GeForce card has clear air between it and the Radeon.
In our testing we’ve used a pretty heftily-overclocked Palit GTX 980, running at 1,329MHz out of the box, for comparison. That’s a card with a GPU offset of over 100MHz on the stock-clocked reference model and on the whole it comes out faster than the GTX 1060, though not by much. And that often minor disparity will all but disappear if the new card is placed up against an old, stock-clocked GTX 980.
Level the playing fields further by overclocking the GTX 1060 too and suddenly the new Pascal card is able to get its nose out in front of even a boosted GTX 980. The overclocking headroom in the GP106 is huge. Our reference card peaked with a 210MHz offset on the GPU itself, which meant it was running under load at just over 2GHz, while still drawing less power than either GTX 980 or AMD RX 480. That’s some seriously impressive performance chops from a potentially $250 (£240) card.
The GTX 1060 doesn’t quite have it all its own way, however. Hitman DX12 is the only released benchmark where the AMD card has the edge, though the DX12 beta Total War: Warhammer test also favours the RX 480 too. I don’t massively trust the Warhammer test yet, given that it’s not a final release and Nvidia cards have a tendency to crash out when you try and change any settings.
That’s not enough to say AMD has the DirectX 12 edge yet; the Rise of the Tomb Raider DX12 test follows the general trend of an Nvidia lead and the new 3DMark Time Spy DX12 benchmark gives the head-to-head win to the GTX 1060 too.
While the jury is still out on the AMD vs Nvidia clash with DirectX 12 there can be no doubt which graphics architecture has the edge with the new Vulkan API. We've just put the GTX 1060 through its paces with the latest patch for Doom, which introduces the open source API to the rebooted shooter, and in a straight head-to-head with AMD's RX 480 the GTX 1060 comes away a brusied and battered GPU.
It's particularly harrowing at 1080p settings where the Radeon card has a 51% lead over the competing GeForce GPU when Vulkan's used. There aren't many games around supporting Vulkan yet and you can be sure Nvidia is hoping there's not many more to come either.
Nvidia GTX 1060 verdict
Nvidia have played the game smartly this time around. By pitching the base price of the GTX 1060 only just above the level the AMD RX 480 is aiming for, Nvidia is able to justify that price premium by simply pointing a finger at the relative benchmark performance of the two stock cards.
Though it remains to be seen just how many GTX 1060s actually appear anywhere near the $249 (£239) price point. In the UK partners are going to struggle to hit that price after taxes and shipping, and in the US the relationship between supply and demand may keep GTX 1060 prices artificially high. I would suggest it will be a long time before we see that many stock-clocked GTX 1060 cards hitting that MSRP level, though all the partners will be releasing cheaper options alongside their inevitable $300+ overclocked versions. At launch there will be some cards at, or close to, the MSRP, but how long they’ll be available before they go out of stock is anyone’s guess.
Because of that the RX 480 is still going to be a tempting option for the price conscious, unwilling to spend over $250 (£250) on this level of GPU. And if the GTX 1050 follows suit it will be a $200 part, leaving AMD with a great chance of taking hold of the sub-$200 market with their upcoming Radeon RX 470. If what our friends at AMD have told us is true, overclocking the RX 470 will net you the same gaming performance as a stock-clocked RX 480.
So, should you buy an Nvidia GTX 1060? If you’re after a sub-$300 graphics card capable of delivering the 1440p goods, at high settings, across most of the top titles of today, then the GTX 1060 is absolutely the card to go for. And if you can find a stock-clocked version retailing for anywhere near a $250 (£250) price point, bite their hands off. Then nip off with the card while they staunch the flow of blood from their stumps.
