GTX 1060 promises GTX 980 performance for $250

Nvidia has lifted the lid on its third card in its new 10XX GeForce graphics card series.

The GTX 1060 positions itself as a direct competitor to AMD’s recently revealed RX 480. While not targeted by name, Nvidia states that its new card is on average 15 per cent faster and over 75 per cent more power efficient than the closest competitive product at stock speeds”.

The RX 480, however, costs just $199. Nvidia hopes to convince gamers to for over the extra $50 for what it describes as GTX 980 beating performance.

For comparison, the 1070 performed around 30-35 per cent ahead of the 980, with the 1080 offering over a 50 per cent performance boost.

For the money buyers will get 6GB of on-board VRAM, three DisplayPorts, a single dual-link DVI port and HDMI 2.0 port, all of which is powered by a single six-pin PCI Express input. There’s no SLI connector, however, ruling out multi-card setups for those who are still into that sort of thing.

Note too that the 1060 is built using Nvidia’s new GP106 processor design. Both the 1070 and 1080 use the GP104 design. Boost clock speeds are pegged at 1.7GHz, which is roughly in line with both the 1070 and 1080. It will also boast a very impressive 120W TDP, making it a cool and economical device.

However, like Nvidia’s other recent releases, initial availability will be limited to the more expensive Founders Edition, which in this instance will retail for $300.