GTX 1660 Ti in a nutshell: all Benchmark and a comparison with the RX Vega 56

Nvidia GeForce GTX 1660 Ti Launch Benchmark
(Picture: Nvidia)

Today the Nvidia GeForce GTX 1660 Ti launched. We have summarized all benchmarks and game results also compared to the RX Vega 56.

GTX 1660 Ti: Turing without Turing features

With the new Turing generation, Nvidia has committed itself above all to one feature: raytracing. This is indicated not only by the new RTX lettering instead of the long established GTX lettering, but also by the pricing and the more or less increased performance. Roughly speaking, the performance apart from raytracing has remained more or less the same if you consider the prices. The RTX 2080 costs as much as a GTX 1080 Ti, but is only clearly superior in a few games. The same game can be played with the RTX 2070 and the GTX 1080. Only the massively expensive RTX 2080 Ti is in a class of its own, and the RTX 2060 is also somewhat reasonable in terms of price-performance ratio.

However, in one sector the tactic does not work: the entry-level or middle class. Therefore Nvidia revived the GTX graphics cards and today launched the GTX 1660 Ti. It is a Turing card, but without the typical Turing features. The TU116 chip completely lacks the tensor and RT cores. The leak that tensor cores are built into the TU116 chip for DLSS is therefore incorrect. Only the memory remains. The GTX 1660 Ti also has 6 gigabytes of GDDR6 memory built in, which is not 14 Gbps, but only 12 Gbps. With this Nvidia wants to better separate the graphics card from the RTX 2060. This memory is connected with a 192 bit interface to the GPU. The CUDA cores are also significantly less than on the RTX 2060. 1,920 CUDA cores are installed on the RTX card, while the GTX 1660 Ti gets by with 1,536 CUDA cores. There are also 96 TMUs and 48 ROPs. The chip clocks to 1,500 MHz in base and can boost to 1,635 MHz.

All GTX 1660 Ti benchmarks in a nutshell

Since we didn’t receive a sample of the GTX 1660 Ti ourselves, we rely on the very detailed benchmarks of our colleagues from ComputerBase.de again this time. We only give here a summary of the benchmarks and performance data, all exact values can be found in their articles.

AAA games: faster than GTX 1070, slower than RX Vega 56

Let’s start with the gaming benchmarks of the GTX 1660 Ti. This time ComputerBase has tested Full HD and WQHD resolutions to better compare performance in the targeted segment. The GTX 1660 Ti is positioned exactly where we have already classified it through leaks. Compared to the GTX 1070, it is a tick faster on Full HD, 1 percent is in the performance rating. Compared to the RX Vega 56, however, it is 5 percent slower. On WQHD, the GTX 1070 and GTX 1660 Ti are equal, while the RX Vega 56 is a good 6 percent faster. In Full HD it achieves 37 percent more performance than the 1060 and 24 percent more performance than the RX 590, while in WHQD it’s even 38 percent faster than the Pascal card and again 24 percent faster than the Polaris card.

Depending on the game, the performance can vary even more. So the graphics card in Assassin’s Creed: Origins is superior to the RX Vega 56 by 4 (Full HD) and 8 percent (WQHD), while the RX Vega 56 in Call of Duty: WWII is a whole 24 and 15 percent faster. Here even the RX 590 comes close to the GTX 1660 Ti and is only 9 percent slower. In Destiny 2 the performance is almost the same, while in WQHD the RX Vega 56 has the advantage. In Elex, F1 2018, Far Cry 5 and Jurassic World the RX Vega 56 is always slightly superior, while in Final Fantasy XV and Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice the GTX 1660 Ti has a clear advantage. The RX Vega 56 in Ghost Recon: Wildlands has to admit defeat.

eSports games: slower than GTX 1070, equal to RX Vega 56

The situation is different with eSports games, where the higher memory does not make the big difference. Here, the GTX 1070 outperforms the GTX 1660 Ti by a good two percent, but is superior to the RX Vega 56 by an average of 3 percent. The big difference is mainly due to World of Warcraft, where the Radeon graphics card was 14 percent slower. In Rainbow Six: Siege and Overwatch, the RX Vega 56 and GTX 1660 Ti on Full HD and WQHD are equal.

Power consumption – lowest consumption of Turing

Also the power consumption is an interesting point of the GTX 1660 Ti. It is currently the most economical Turing graphics card. Thus, the two tested models of ComputerBase consume only 118 and 126 watts respectively under gaming load and are thus also ahead of the GTX 1070 with 145 watts and just behind the GTX 1060 with 112 watts. The RX Vega 56 is much more power hungry with 211 watts. In desktop mode, 9 or 10 watts are on the performance scale, watching YouTube videos 16 or 18 watts respectively. This is better than the RX Vega 56, which needs 12 watts in the desktop and 27 watts in YouTube mode. This is also reflected in the performance per watt rating. The models of the GTX 1660 Ti are at the top of the list and are therefore more economical than all other current graphics cards.

Overclocking the GTX 1660 Ti pays off

The GTX 1660 Ti comes with a reference clock of 1,500 MHz and a boost of 1,635 MHz. However, most custom models are already overclocked, which can significantly increase performance. However, there is still considerable room for improvement, especially with regard to memory. So this clocks only on 6.000 MHz. ComputerBase could easily increase this clock rate to 7.251 MHz with the Asus Strix version. Also the chip itself could be overclocked well with this graphics card. The maximum here was 1.958 MHz. As a result of these measures, performance increased by a further seven to nine percent. Above all the higher memory clock delivers a lot more performance.

Conclusion: energy-saving, but not better than the RX Vega 56

Nvidia sends the GTX 1660 Ti into the mid-range ring. It scores above all by a more favorable price, GDDR6 memory and a very good power efficiency. The performance in most games competes easily with the GTX 1070, but doesn’t always come close to the RX Vega 56. But the graphics card still has a bit of a bland aftertaste. The 6 gigabytes of memory are sufficient on Full HD without any problems, but can become a problem with WQHD. Moreover, the price is not very good, especially in comparison to the RX Vega 56. AMD currently positions the graphics card at $279 to offend Nvidia. The cheapest model of the GTX 1660 Ti currently also costs $279.99, the most expensive significantly more than $350. But as soon as the prices of the GTX 1660 Ti fall below $250, AMD will have a hard time in this class – until the new Radeon Navi generation arrives. However, at the moment, the RX Vega 56 or even the RTX 2060 is a better advice.

About Florian Maislinger 1222 Articles
Florian Maislinger is author and founder of PC Builder's Club. As a skilled IT engineer, he is very familiar with computers and hardware and has been a technology lover since childhood. He is mainly responsible for the news and our social media channels.

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