RX 480 or GTX 1060?

[Deleted]

Hi again!

I'm going to buy a gaming PC soon and I can't really decide which GPU to go for.
I feel like I will enjoy the 1060 more but it doesn't support SLI so it's not good for the future. Meanwhile, the rx 480 supports SLI, I heard 480 performs as good as 1060 does and it's future-proof with SLI being supported. I am still not sure which one to go for though.

What are your thoughts and which GPU do you recommend?

[Thunderball]

SLI/Crossfire is a bad idea in general, support for it is in decline (wasnt that good before). Generally better to go with a single powerful card.

[aysatsana]

From what I've read the 1060 is better overall for DX11 games but the RX 480 will be better for newer games. I'd say the 1060 has the edge overall but the RX480 is better in newer games, and of course you can SLI it later on if you want that. You should check benchmarks (like this) and see which games you play and how each card performs on each, but honestly the difference is a couple of FPS at most, you can't go wrong with either IMO. Both should perform well at 1080p.

Personally I bought a 1060 instead (even though I really wanted to go with AMD), because:
- It's better for WoW (nvidia usually is better for WoW) and games I play
- It's quieter and consumes less power, something I really wanted for my build. My 1060 fan only turns on when it's really pushed hard. In WoW the fan is idle. My whole build is nearly silent right now. My 7950 was like a jet engine in comparison...
- It took forever for the RX480 aftermarket coolers to come out, and I got impatient
- I don't care for SLI

[Fascinate]

They really arent close in performance in a lot of games tho, especially ones made by blizzard:
https://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/...X_1060/23.html
http://www.techspot.com/review/1209-...060/page2.html

As for SLI, its almost never a good idea. I have a 760 i could buy a used one for SLI for ~100 bucks but it makes more sense to just sell my card to put towards a 1060 for more performance, less power consumption/heat but most importantly to avoid driver issues.

480 isnt a bad card and can come close to 1060 in some games, but if you play any blizzard games i would go the nvidia route for sure.

[DrStiglit]

With DX12 there will be new ways to use multi gpu without bridges.But like Thunderball said more powerful single GPU is the way to go.

[Life-Binder]

GTX 1060 for sure, it draws less power (and thus less heat and more quiet cooler), is 10%+ faster overall and ~15-20% faster in Blizzard games/WoW


480 only beats 1060 in 2 games - Doom Vulkan and Hitman

1060 ties in some others and wins in the rest

[Koboldius]

Seriously the difference in performance is so small that I would look at the board partner and your current monitor setup.

RX480 is better in DX12 + Vulcan (future), Freesync monitors are cheaper + 8GB + Crossfire Support

GTX 1060 is better in DX11, about 30 Watt less, performs better in WoW

I think I would go for the Powercolor 480 or MSI 480 but you cant go wrong with a 1060 card.

[AztechZero]

There's one particular RX 480 that performs within single digit % of a 1060 at base clocks. That's the MSI RX 480 Gaming X, pushed to it's absolute limit. If you overclock any 1060, it pulls ahead by a fair margin. That being said, both are good cards for their price range. I'd get which ever one best fits within your budget. If you find a 1060 cheaper than or about the same price as the MSI RX 480 jump on it.

[Koboldius]

The difference between a Custom 1060 vs a OC 480 in 1080p is about 3-5% so yeah...



In short: If you already have a G-sync monitor get a 1060 and if you use a freesync monitor a 480. The difference is way bigger than some fps you wont notice.
And if you only play WoW then pick the 1060 because in this game the difference is bigger.

[Deleted]

They really arent close in performance in a lot of games tho, especially ones made by blizzard:
https://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/...X_1060/23.html
http://www.techspot.com/review/1209-...060/page2.html

As for SLI, its almost never a good idea. I have a 760 i could buy a used one for SLI for ~100 bucks but it makes more sense to just sell my card to put towards a 1060 for more performance, less power consumption/heat but most importantly to avoid driver issues.

480 isnt a bad card and can come close to 1060 in some games, but if you play any blizzard games i would go the nvidia route for sure.

The only issue regarding whatever setting the benchmarkers used in that warcraft test was, both cards pulled above 100 fps at 1080p... however in raiding neither card will net you 60 fps at very high/max settings so either card is fine.

However as one poster mentioned, a number of new games and ones coming out on the Xbox store have all been in favour of AMD so far, Quantum break just does not like Nvidia, but if the price is about the same and you only play blizzard games, the 1060 will let you crank up the settings more outside raiding (though the high fidelity settings will most likely bring the 1060 to its knees anyways).

If you do any rendering, apparently the RX480 is pretty damn good as it has a dedicated chip to allow for this.

[Celia]

It boils down to two things: how long will you have the card, and are you going to use a variable refresh monitor?

The longer you use the card, the better the AMD option is. As time goes on more games will use DX12 instead of DX11, which is an AMD advantage. Over time driver updates tend to give AMD cards more improvements than Nvidia cards as well; probably because Nvidia cards are better optimized to begin with.

If you're planning on going variable refresh / adaptive sync then the answer is AMD easily. The cheapest G-Sync monitors are almost 400$ while the cheapest FreeSync monitors are about 130$. How much more computer can you buy for around 250$?

[Deleted]

From what I've read the 1060 is better overall for DX11 games but the RX 480 will be better for newer games. I'd say the 1060 has the edge overall but the RX480 is better in newer games, and of course you can SLI it later on if you want that. You should check benchmarks (like this) and see which games you play and how each card performs on each, but honestly the difference is a couple of FPS at most, you can't go wrong with either IMO. Both should perform well at 1080p.

Personally I bought a 1060 instead (even though I really wanted to go with AMD), because:
- It's better for WoW (nvidia usually is better for WoW) and games I play
- It's quieter and consumes less power, something I really wanted for my build. My 1060 fan only turns on when it's really pushed hard. In WoW the fan is idle. My whole build is nearly silent right now. My 7950 was like a jet engine in comparison...
- It took forever for the RX480 aftermarket coolers to come out, and I got impatient
- I don't care for SLI

Oh wow. Thanks for the reply. I don't really play the newer games, I mainly play WoW.
Can I ask what settings you're playing at? What's your FPS? Did you buy an OC/STRIX 1060? And finally, which CPU do you have?
Sorry for asking too much, first time buying a PC.

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SLI/Crossfire is a bad idea in general, support for it is in decline (wasnt that good before). Generally better to go with a single powerful card.

Oh, I read it somewhere but I wasn't sure if I remembered correct. I guess this means that no SLI is the way to go.

[Artorius]

The answer is simple.

If you think you'll buy another card soon (let's say in a year or two) and the price difference between the two isn't significant, then 1060.

If the cards are at their respective MSRPs or you intend to keep the card for longer than 2 years then clearly the 480 due to better aging of AMD cards.

[aysatsana]

Oh wow. Thanks for the reply. I don't really play the newer games, I mainly play WoW.
Can I ask what settings you're playing at? What's your FPS? Did you buy an OC/STRIX 1060? And finally, which CPU do you have?
Sorry for asking too much, first time buying a PC.

I play at "basically" max settings (9, I could do 10 but I don't really care), with CMAA at 1080p resolution. Basically maxed out. It runs more than well, no complaints. I put my FPS limiter to 100 in WoW, so it's pretty much always between 90 and 100. It would be >100 if I didn't have the limiter on it. Of course it will drop in heavy raids but that's just the nature of WoW, you can't do much about it.

I have the STRIX 1060. I would probably get the cheaper versions if I was you, the one I got is a bit expensive and the cooler is overkill. It's such a lower power and heat card that any of the aftermarket cards will cool it just fine. But I love it, even if I had to pay a premium for it. Fans don't even turn on even while playing WoW.

My CPU is an i5 2500k, overclocked at 4.5ghz. It's an older CPU but it's still performing well for my needs so I don't see the reason to upgrade right now. Newer CPU's will probably give you more FPS in WoW though, since it's more of a CPU intensive game.

You can't go wrong with a 1060 for WoW. WoW in the first place isn't even a demanding or recent game, so I'd even say the 1060 is overkill for WoW, which is a good thing I guess.

[Deleted]

I play at "basically" max settings (9, I could do 10 but I don't really care), with CMAA at 1080p resolution. Basically maxed out. It runs more than well, no complaints. I put my FPS limiter to 100 in WoW, so it's pretty much always between 90 and 100. It would be >100 if I didn't have the limiter on it. Of course it will drop in heavy raids but that's just the nature of WoW, you can't do much about it.

I have the STRIX 1060. I would probably get the cheaper versions if I was you, the one I got is a bit expensive and the cooler is overkill. It's such a lower power and heat card that any of the aftermarket cards will cool it just fine. But I love it, even if I had to pay a premium for it. Fans don't even turn on even while playing WoW.

My CPU is an i5 2500k, overclocked at 4.5ghz. It's an older CPU but it's still performing well for my needs so I don't see the reason to upgrade right now. Newer CPU's will probably give you more FPS in WoW though, since it's more of a CPU intensive game.

You can't go wrong with a 1060 for WoW. WoW in the first place isn't even a demanding or recent game, so I'd even say the 1060 is overkill for WoW, which is a good thing I guess.

Just for the matter of interest, thats not the definition of max, you are playing on high-very high settings, if you are giving advice, best to use correct terminology otherwise you are giving a false impression.

[aysatsana]

Just for the matter of interest, thats not the definition of max, you are playing on high-very high settings, if you are giving advice, best to use correct terminology otherwise you are giving a false impression.

I said "basically" max. I can play it at 10 fine. Just the CMAA that isn't max I guess?

[Deleted]

It boils down to two things: how long will you have the card, and are you going to use a variable refresh monitor?

The longer you use the card, the better the AMD option is. As time goes on more games will use DX12 instead of DX11, which is an AMD advantage. Over time driver updates tend to give AMD cards more improvements than Nvidia cards as well; probably because Nvidia cards are better optimized to begin with.

If you're planning on going variable refresh / adaptive sync then the answer is AMD easily. The cheapest G-Sync monitors are almost 400$ while the cheapest FreeSync monitors are about 130$. How much more computer can you buy for around 250$?

I'd like to use the GPU as long as possible tbh. I was planning on getting a 144hz 24" monitor. I heard 1060 performs well in DX12 too, so it shouldn't be a problem.

[Deleted]

I said "basically" max. I can play it at 10 fine. Just the CMAA that isn't max I guess?

Still a twist of the word however 10 is SSAA at maximum or thats the render scale at 200%, its the most demanding feature of the settings tab, if that slider is still at 100%, then crank it to 200% and see how your fps holds up :P.

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Either card is good, if its just WoW and the prices for both gpus are close- both being aftermarket that is, get the 1060, getting hold of an aftermarket RX480 is gold dust at the moment.

[Deleted]

I play at "basically" max settings (9, I could do 10 but I don't really care), with CMAA at 1080p resolution. Basically maxed out. It runs more than well, no complaints. I put my FPS limiter to 100 in WoW, so it's pretty much always between 90 and 100. It would be >100 if I didn't have the limiter on it. Of course it will drop in heavy raids but that's just the nature of WoW, you can't do much about it.

I have the STRIX 1060. I would probably get the cheaper versions if I was you, the one I got is a bit expensive and the cooler is overkill. It's such a lower power and heat card that any of the aftermarket cards will cool it just fine. But I love it, even if I had to pay a premium for it. Fans don't even turn on even while playing WoW.

My CPU is an i5 2500k, overclocked at 4.5ghz. It's an older CPU but it's still performing well for my needs so I don't see the reason to upgrade right now. Newer CPU's will probably give you more FPS in WoW though, since it's more of a CPU intensive game.

You can't go wrong with a 1060 for WoW. WoW in the first place isn't even a demanding or recent game, so I'd even say the 1060 is overkill for WoW, which is a good thing I guess.

Really? That is awesome, I guess I will be able to play at 10 with good FPS aswell since I am getting a i5-6600K CPU which is newer.
I might go for STRIX OC 1060 since it seems to be very nice with strix. I know nothing about overclocking so it'd be a good idea to buy an overclocked one.
Components are more expensive here in Sweden so the minimum price for 1060 is 332$ and 425-442$ for the Strix Oc version. That's too much but nothing you can do, I'll see if I can manage to get the STRIX OC 1060 but looks like it will be the 332$ MSI GeForce GTX 1060 6GB OC one.

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Forgot to mention that the rx 480 costs around 330$

[Thunderball]

Really? That is awesome, I guess I will be able to play at 10 with good FPS aswell since I am getting a i5-6600K CPU which is newer.
I might go for STRIX OC 1060 since it seems to be very nice with strix. I know nothing about overclocking so it'd be a good idea to buy an overclocked one.
Components are more expensive here in Sweden so the minimum price for 1060 is 332$ and 425-442$ for the Strix Oc version. That's too much but nothing you can do, I'll see if I can manage to get the STRIX OC 1060 but looks like it will be the 332$ MSI GeForce GTX 1060 6GB OC one.

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Forgot to mention that the rx 480 costs around 330$

As the person you quoted mentioned, STRIX is an overkill. Avoid single fan versions and stick with manufacturers like EVGA, Palit, Gainward, Zotac, Gigabyte, MSI, ASUS (this is probably sorted right by the price increase). If you're looking to overclock your card make sure it has additional power over the stock design (originally has 1x8pin, so you're looking for 1x8pin+1x6pin or 2x8pin depending on how far you want to go).