Is 3GB enough for 1080p?

[frozentundra123456]

Next time just put a big asterix next to any quantitative data you decide to make up.

Yea, here is a comprehensive test by hardware.fr 1060 3gb review .
In short, compared to the 470, in 13 games, the 1060 3gb is 7% faster, has about 10% more overclocking headroom, and uses 10 to 70 watts less power at load, depending on the model tested (most were around 40 watts less).

 

[kawi6rr]

Nope. As soon as the entire system can't be cooled passively, More power = more heat = more noise.

Put the same cooler on a 1060 and a 470. The cooler will spin the fans up more for the 470 even though the 470 will produce lower FPS. More noise, less FPS.

Put the same cooler on a 470 and 570. More noise again because the 570 is essentially factory overclocked and much less power efficient.

That's given a similar temperature of course. You can also choose to cook your components in exchange for less noise. But if you want the same temperatures we're back to power = heat = noise.

Maybe the difference won't be significant enough for you to care about, but it will still exist.

AnandTechs own review has them prettty quiet under load compared to the competition.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/11278/amd-radeon-rx-580-rx-570-review

It doesn't matter if you put the same cooler on another card as long as it keeps your card quiet. Don't try to move the goal post.

 

[DaveSimmons]

AnandTechs own review has them prettty quiet under load compared to the competition.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/11278/amd-radeon-rx-580-rx-570-review

It doesn't matter if you put the same cooler on another card as long as it keeps your card quiet. Don't try to move the goal post.

Sorry, you're the one moving the goalpost. "pretty quiet under load" does nothing to disprove that power = heat = noise. That noise might be "pretty quiet" but without the wasted power it would be closer to silent.

Just to be more clear, I've said "noise" all along. Perhaps you've been misreading that as "noisy" (loud)? They are not the same thing.

 

[kawi6rr]

"Rx 570 with a great aftermarket cooler is less noisy than 1060 with cheap cooler" does not contradict this. "I don't care about noise" also does not contradict this.

Thanks for proving what I was saying.

The 570 is hotter and more power hungry then the 1060 but with a good cooler on it it's quieter. Therefore more power/heat does not make more noise but noisy fans make more noise.

 

[mohit9206]

This does not look like 10% faster on average to me...

Math, how does it work?

Look now its faster than RX480!

 

[tamz_msc]

Sorry, you're the one moving the goalpost. "pretty quiet under load" does nothing to disprove that power = heat = noise. That noise might be "pretty quiet" but without the wasted power it would be closer to silent.

Just to be more clear, I've said "noise" all along. Perhaps you've been misreading that as "noisy" (loud)? They are not the same thing.

Just what is your point exactly? Are you arguing that since the RX 570 outputs more heat, the fans on it will always spin up faster than the GTX 1060 3GB and hence will be louder?

There is zero evidence for this to be always true, meaning that picking a GTX 1060 3GB and RX 570 4GB at random does not guarantee that the former will be quieter just because it outputs less heat.

MSI Gaming X 3GB:

Zotac Mini 1060 3GB:

Sapphire RX 570 Pulse:

 

[DaveSimmons]

Thanks for proving what I was saying.

The 570 is hotter and more power hungry then the 1060 but with a good cooler on it it's quieter. Therefore more power/heat does not make more noise but noisy fans make more noise.

Still not correct. The 570's cooler needs to spin its fans more than it would with a less power hungry design. Power = heat = noise. More power = more heat = more noise.

Attach that same cooler to a 470 and it will be closer to silent, because the 470 isn't pushing the GPU as close to its limits and wastes less power.

 

[DaveSimmons]

Just what is your point exactly? Are you arguing that since the RX 570 outputs more heat, the fans on it will always spin up faster than the GTX 1060 3GB and hence will be louder?

There is zero evidence for this to be always true, meaning that picking a GTX 1060 3GB and RX 570 4GB at random does not guarantee that the former will be quieter just because it outputs less heat.

I have not ever claimed that. I've just argued against "power use does not create noise" and "power use does not matter."

My point exactly is that power becomes heat, over time and above passive limits heat must be cooled, and that cooling is not silent. Power = heat = noise.

That means if you care about minimizing noise you should care about power efficiency.

You can use larger fans and bigger heatsinks to reduce noise, but the minimum noise level with the best possible cooling design will become higher as power use increases.

So a CPU that uses 150 watts to do the work another CPU does with 95 is less quiet, given the same overall thermal solution for the PC.

So a GPU that uses 200 watts to do the work that another GPU does with 170 is less quiet, given the same overall thermal solution for the PC.

You do have to look at the whole PC. A GPU design that runs quietly by heating up the CPU and letting the case fans remove the heat means those fans must run louder to maintain a given temperature.

People claiming "the card runs quiet" miss the point that with a more power efficient design the same card would run closer to silent with the same load.

Anyway, I seem to have derailed the green vs. red battle over frames per second. A little extra noise doesn't bother many people.

 

[tamz_msc]

I have not ever claimed that. I've just argued against "power use does not create noise" and "power use does not matter."

My point exactly is that power becomes heat, over time and above passive limits heat must be cooled, and that cooling is not silent. Power = heat = noise.

That mean if you care about minimizing noise you should care about power efficiency.

You can use larger fans and bigger heatsinks to reduce noise, but the minimum noise level with the best possible cooling design will become higher as power use increases.

So a CPU that uses 150 watts to do the work another CPU does with 95 is less quiet, given the same overall thermal solution for the PC.

So a GPU that uses 200 watts to do the work that another GPU does with 170 is less quiet, given the same overall thermal solution for the PC.

You do have to look at the whole PC. A GPU design that runs quietly by heating up the CPU and letting the case fans remove the heat means those fans must run louder to maintain a given temperature.

People claiming "the card runs quiet" miss the point that with a more power efficient design the same card would run closer to silent with the same load.

Anyway, I seem to have derailed the green vs. red battle over frames per second. A little extra noise doesn't bother many people.

I'm not doubting your statement that all things being equal, more power = more heat = more noise. But the important catch here is 'all things being equal', and when comparing cards, they're almost never equal in terms of their cooling solutions.

 

[Kallogan]

i have the 1060 3GB on my laptop, it's a full 1280 pipelines, not cut down like the desktop model.

it's a capable gpu to play games at 1080p on high textures. Not good for ultra textures but i can't tell a difference between high and ultra textures on my 15.6 screen anyway. Maybe on a bigger screen and res it would matter.

Modern games are very poorly optimized though, even with good average fps, there is annoying stuttering pretty often. Am so glad i didn't go for a 1050 ti. Anything below a gtx 1060 is not even worth considering to play recent titles imo.

 

[2is]

Thanks for proving what I was saying.

The 570 is hotter and more power hungry then the 1060 but with a good cooler on it it's quieter. Therefore more power/heat does not make more noise but noisy fans make more noise.

It's not proving what you're saying. These are not mutually exclusive arguments. A better cooler can be quieter on a hotter card than a crappier cooler, sure. But equal coolers will be louder on the hotter card.

The difference is you're saying heat is not a factor at all, which makes your statement less accurate. No one is saying fans aren't a factor. Anyone can prove your argument wrong all day. My fans are off on my 989ti when I'm on my desktop. When I load a game they turn on. Physics dictate they HAVE to make noise when they're on. It's the same cooler and same fans when I'm playing a game vs when I'm browsing the internet. The only change is the card is running hotter. That there proves that heat IS a factor.

 

[maddogmcgee]

Personally, I have always picked the type of video card I want. Then, once I have decided on that, I have picked a model with the acoustics I wanted.

The one time I did not do this was when i was sucked into the 970 so efficient, it doesn't need a good fan hype. The card sounded so horrible (and the shop refused to let me return it) I had to buy an arctic cooler to slap on it.

 

[OatisCampbell]

Thinking about getting a GeForce GTX 1060 3gb to pair up with my aging i5 2500k but wondering which one to get. My monitor is 1080p 60hz. I will not be upgrading the monitor until after my next build. So would the 3 GB version of the GTX 1060 be good enough to push 1080p for the next couple years (until like early /mid 2019)?

Here is the one I am looking at (only $159 after MIR):
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01KUCL25Y/ref=ox_sc_act_title_2?ie=UTF8&psc=1&smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER

A trip to newegg showed me a couple 6GB 1060s for $220 and a 8gb 480 for $230..
That's $60-$70, the price of a new game or a tank of gas. You mention wanting to keep this card two years, that is $30-$35 more per year.

Is there any "real" reason to not spend this $60-$70 now and not have to think about the memory question at all?

If you're a kid and your grandma gave you $150 for your birthday and you have no income, I get it.

If you're a person with a job, the question makes no sense. You don't shoot yourself in the foot over $60-$70.. (at least in my opinion)

No one here can tell you what games coming out in the next two years will need, but it's a pretty good bet you can exceed 3GB in some games at 1080p today.

https://www.reddit.com/r/buildapc/comments/2vcepp/discussion_4gb_vram_being_used_at_1080p_in_2/

 

[96Firebird]

For those still suggesting cards...

http://www.portvapes.co.uk/?id=Latest-exam-1Z0-876-Dumps&exid=threads/is-3gb-enough-for-1080p.2505658/page-2#post-38882772

I believe the OP bought a 1060 6GB for around $200. Good deals can be very enticing...

 

[TeknoBug]

Some games are using >4GB of VRAM now even at 1080p, such as the recent PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds but that's if you turn up texture to high or ultra which helps in spotting other players.

 

[OatisCampbell]

For those still suggesting cards...

http://www.portvapes.co.uk/?id=Latest-exam-1Z0-876-Dumps&exid=threads/is-3gb-enough-for-1080p.2505658/page-2#post-38882772

I believe the OP bought a 1060 6GB for around $200. Good deals can be very enticing...

Excellent, I must not have gotten to that post before replying.
(although I suppose my advice is still valid for anyone else making the perennial "should I save $50 on a video card" question)

 

[Madpacket]

Some games are using >4GB of VRAM now even at 1080p, such as the recent PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds but that's if you turn up texture to high or ultra which helps in spotting other players.

That's a terribly optimized game (although pretty fun!). Hopefully they can fix the performance issues before release.

 

[IEC]

Amusing that in the context of arguing over noise of cards, the GTX 1060 that the OP went with is literally the worst cooled 1060 on the market (not that it makes any difference on a 1060, except for max boost clock/OCing).

Still, it's great that it's 6GB and not the gimped 3GB card. I'd forgotten the 3GB version is a cut down 1060 chip when I purchased mine. Was rather annoying to be vRAM limited AND have lower performance to boot.

 

[TeknoBug]

That's a terribly optimized game (although pretty fun!). Hopefully they can fix the performance issues before release.

It's already had a couple optimization patches, I can get 70-120fps with settings turned up (turning settings down to very low forces the game to load on CPU rather than GPU).

 

[Headfoot]

For those still suggesting cards...

http://www.portvapes.co.uk/?id=Latest-exam-1Z0-876-Dumps&exid=threads/is-3gb-enough-for-1080p.2505658/page-2#post-38882772

I believe the OP bought a 1060 6GB for around $200. Good deals can be very enticing...

Good. 3GB 1060 will turn out exactly like the 2GB 960 did. A turd that needs replacing 2 years after it came out when its contemporaries (e.g. cards with $30) are plugging along just fine. I remember how people bent over backwards to avoid saying someone should spend another $50 to get a 290 over a 960. What a joke. Now we see the same thing all over again.

Partisans will do their best to through favorable FPS averages (of course, never linking reviews with credible minimums or frame time analysis which actually examines the stage where RAM starts to run out) and completely ignore the fact that nobody buy 1060-class cards uses them for just 6-12 months. Even nVidia's marketing and research showed they hold on to low-midrange cards for 2 to 3 generations. Anyone who thinks 1060 3GB is a better buy than anything with more RAM for somebody who is statistically highly likely to continue using the card for 2-4 years is willfully blind due to brand favoritism or e-peen swinging on the internet to try and prove a point.