When it comes to graphics cards, you will encounter to buy one usually once every 5 years. By the time you will go to a store to customize your parts, you’ll decide in one of the most important parts of your experience…the graphics card.
We here at Hungry Geeks aren’t the hard-core gamers, but more of the casual gamers who play some PS4, Overwatch, Dota 2 and some rendering at the side. So it was a great opportunity for us when ASUS offered us to review the Strix GTX1060 6GB OC edition graphics card.
It’s a graphics card meant for all-around users, no special G-Sync monitor required but can simply cater a 100Hz and above monitor. Plus, a power requirement fit for mid to high-end professions such as our graphics rendering and gaming.
ASUS Strix GTX 1060 6GB OC Specifications
- NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060
- GDDR5 6GB VRAM
- PCI Express 3.0
- OC Mode – GPU Boost Clock: 1873 MHz , GPU Base Clock: 1645 MHz
Gaming Mode (Default) – GPU Boost Clock: 1847 MHz , GPU Base Clock: 1620 MHz - Cuda Core – 1280
- Memory Interface – 192-bit
- Maximum Resolution – 7680×4320
- Ports – DVI Output : Yes x 1 (Native) (DVI-D)| HDMI Output : Yes x 2 (Native) (HDMI 2.0) | Display Port : Yes x 2 (Native) (Regular DP) | HDCP Support : Yes
- Software: ASUS GPU Tweak II & Driver
- RGB ASUS AURA Lighting
- Dimensions: 11.73 ” x 5.28 ” x 1.57 ” Inch
- Freebie: xSplit Gamecaster 1-Year
Design
A graphics card which is above reference, the goal of a more symbolic based item is needed. It should look good when inserted and unmounted, that’s why ASUS understands this feeling and made the unit looking like a weapon.
It has three fans with accent RGB lighting at the top and bottom, carvings and designs are based on their Strix design philosophy of lean and edgy lines paired with their Mayan-inspired patterns.
At one look, you’ll see the premium face plate used, and even attention to small detail such as accent detail on the top for your unit to flaunt when mounted. Unfortunately, our system wasn’t ASUS AURA ready so we weren’t able to maximize the RGB lighting but it works well even at standalone.
Performance
As expected on a mid-range graphics card of 1060, it enables the things what the 980Ti can do before at a much affordable price. The pascal architecture is just better at being more efficient and outshines the 900 series graphics behind with a recognizable margin.
What’s good in our tests and experience, we didn’t encounter any thermal throttling as the unit was able to maintain a good temperature of 60- 75 degrees celsius even on overclock mode.
Fire Strike extreme showed good results as well despite the single GPU setup, it just proves that the unit can handle up to 4K gaming with decent settings. Just don’t overload the PC with other applications running, web apps are alright but not like photoshop to avoid a clash of resources.
Our games in Overwatch in Ultra settings proved easy as pie for the graphics, we were able to get 70fps (Display-based) or around 140fps if the limiter is disabled.
Interface
The GPU Tweak software is a dedicated one just for the GPU, you can control easily in 4 modes such as silent, gaming, OC mode or your own preference. You can also activate the 0db fan to deactivate the fans when recording audio or simply when not necessary.
Advance settings can let you tweak the graphics card in a more specific manner. In our exprience we didn’t meddle in this part as the graphics is working more then efficient in our preference.
Freebie – Xsplit
If you are an avid gamer who likes to share, xSplit partnered with ASUS to bring you live casting even better. xSplit Game caster is a simple program that can let you cast your game with camera feed and even interact live.
The GTX1060 series has a free 14-day premium and 1-year subscription free with an authentication method. A Php3,000 pesos value for free and assurance of full compatibility with ASUS graphics card.
We tried this for fun and the xSplit interface is really easy to learn. But should you need to insert graphics and others, you will need to upgrade to the xSplit broadcaster for better compatibility.
Conclusion
To summarize, the Strix GTX 1060 6GB OC edition graphics card is a delight to use. Other 1060 cards might offer the similar performance, but we are well assured of ASUS’ thermal capabilities that this one will last long. It showed great performance without throttling under stress, something you will be amused of when it comes to years ahead.
The price of the Strix GTX1060 is around Php16,200 and yes…it’s not cheap, but still cheaper than previous GTX 980 cards that goes as much as 25k and above. The lesson here is that the Strix GTX 1060 is an investment for those who doesn’t tinker much in their PC, just play, work and have fun without any worries.
If something should happen, ASUS has a 3-year warranty on their graphics card to back them out. So we think this is a great investment as the last part in your PC you won’t like to break down is the graphics card.
That’s why we give the ROG Strix GTX 1060 our seal of approval as a 100% satisfying graphics card. Not only it performs well but also can handle high demanding loads without producing too much heat that can result to thermal throttling of performance.
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