Nvidia GTX 1060 6GB Founders Edition Review

1. Introduction2. Nvidia GTX 1060 Founders Edition3. Testing Methodology4. 3DMark5. Unigine Valley6. Ashes of the Singularity7. Grand Theft Auto V8. Metro Last Light Redux9. Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor10. Rise of the Tomb Raider11. Acoustic Performance12. Temperatures13. Power Consumption14. Overclocking15. Conclusion16. View All Pages

AMD's decision to launch its first next-gen 14nm GPU in the mid-range, the RX 480, has invoked an almost instantaneous response from its rival Nvidia. AMD released the RX 480 at the end of June into the crucial sub-$250 segment and not even a month later Nvidia is ready with its direct competition – the GTX 1060. 

Unlike the GTX 1080 and GTX 1070 which are both based on GP104 , the GTX 1060 introduces the new Pascal GP106 GPU which, although smaller, shares many traits with GP104 including Simultaneous Multi-Projection, enhanced memory compression and support for new technologies, such as Ansel.

GP106 delivers up to 10 streaming multiprocessors compared to up to 20 on GP104, this means the total GTX 1060 CUDA core count is 1,280 rather than 2,560 (GTX 1080) or 1,920 (GTX 1070). That reduction in CUDA cores brings a respective drop in power consumption as the GTX 1060 has a 120-watt TDP, which is the same as the previous-gen GTX 960 but 30-watts lower than AMD's RX 480.

At $249 the Nvidia GTX 1060 goes head to head with the AMD RX 480 8GB, though AMD also offers a 4GB variation starting at $199. However, it should be noted that, like with the GTX 1080 and GTX 1070, the Founders Edition is more expensive than entry pricing – $299 in the case of the GTX 1060.

The decision to offer 6GB of VRAM puts the GTX 1060, perhaps deliberately so, right between AMD's two RX 480 models. That 6GB frame buffer seems like a sweet spot for covering the rare handful of games or applications that could creep beyond a 4GB frame buffer.

Nvidia hasn't detailed if the GTX 1060 is aimed a specific audience though it seems probable Nvidia has its sights on the mainstream 1080p and ever-growing 1440p markets given the GTX 1060's price point.

4K-leaning Gamers would benefit from the more potent GTX 1070 or higher, though it wasn't that long ago the GTX 980 was aimed towards 4K gamers and Nvidia claims the GTX 1060 offers GTX 980-like levels of performance, make of that what you will. Although, the omission of SLI capability limits the 4K potential of the GTX 1060.

Expect a capable Virtual Reality experience with the GTX 1060 too, Nvidia's own figures claim a 24 % advantage over AMD's RX 480. That being said we'd imagine given the significant expense of VR headsets that early adopters of this technology would lean towards a higher-performance offering, something circa $400+.

GPU	AMD RX 480	Nvidia GTX 960	Nvidia GTX 970	Nvidia GTX 1060	Nvidia GTX 1070	Nvidia GTX 1080
Streaming Multiprocessors / Compute Units	36	8	13	10	15	20
GPU Cores	2304	1024	1664	1280	1920	2560
Base Clock	1120 MHz	1126 MHz	1050 MHz	1506 MHz	1506 MHz	1607 MHz
GPU Boost Clock	1266 MHz	1178 MHz	1178 MHz	1708 MHz	1683 MHz	1733 MHz
Total Video memory	4096 or 8192 MB	2048 or 4096 MB	4096 MB	6144 MB	8192 MB	8192 MB
Texture Units	144	64	104	80	120	160
Texture fill-rate	GT/s	72 GT/s	109.2 GT/s	120.5 GT/s	180.7 GT/s	257.1 GT/s
Memory Clock	7000 or 8000 MHz	7000 MHz	7000 MHz	4006 MHz	4006 MHz	5005 MHz
Memory Bandwidth	224 or 256 GB/s	112 GB/s	224 GB/s	192 GB/s	256 GB/s	320 GB/s
Bus Width	256-bit	128-bit	256-bit	192-bit	256-bit	256-bit
ROPs	32	32	56	48	64	64
Manufacturing Process	14nm	28nm	28nm	16nm	16nm	16nm
TDP	150 W	120 W	145 W	120 W	150 W	180 W

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