GIGABYTE GeForce GTX 1660 SUPER OC Review

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GIGABYTE GeForce GTX 1660 SUPER OC 6G

A quick note about the branding, this is a GIGABYTE video card, GIGABYTE branded. This particular video card is not branded under GIGABYTE’s AORUS lineup. You will find this video card under GIGABYTE’s other GeForce GTX 1660 SUPER video cards, there are three variants, this is the middle-one. In our graphs moving forward we have erroneously put the name AORUS on the graphs as according to the sales kit it looked like it was, but just for clarification this is not an AORUS branded card, it is GIGABYTE only. It doesn’t change anything, we just want to make sure we are super clear on what this video card is.

Today’s retail add-in-board partner custom video card we have for review is the GIGABYTE GeForce GTX 1660 SUPER OC 6G (GV-N166SOC-6GD).  On the positive side, GIGABYTE is not charging you an arm and a leg, even though it is a custom video card, with a custom heatsink, and a good factory overclock.  GIGABYTE’s pricing on this video card is $229.99 after rebate for this video card.  Ultimately it can be had for the same price as the MSRP of the reference pricing.

Factory Overclock

The GIGABYTE video card offers many exciting things that encourage overclocking.  Firstly, GIGABYTE offers a factory overclock on this video card.  Even if you don’t want to overclock you’ll know you are getting better than reference performance with this video card.  The boost clock is set to 1830MHz on this video card instead of the 1785MHz reference clock speed. 

With GPU Boost and the cooling configuration on this video card, it means the clock speed should run even higher than that while gaming.  We will see how high further in this review. Naturally, this video card also has the new 6GB GDDR6 at 14MHz on a 192-bit bus as the SUPER name implies.

Cooling

GIGABYTE has put its WINDFORCE 2x cooling system on this video card.  This features 2x 90mm unique blade fans that spin in alternate directions.  The fans also have triangular fan edge and air is guided smoothly through the 3D stripe curve on the fan surface enhancing the airflow.  The fans also support 3D Active Fan so that they provide semi-passive cooling and remain off at lower temperatures or power demand. 

There is a single large composite copper heat pipe that touches directly with the GPU.  The heat pipe also covers the VRAM through a large metal plate contact to ensure cooling of the memory as well.  The composite heat-pipe combines thermal conductivity and phase transition to manage heat transfer between two solid interfaces.

Ultra Durable

GIGABYTE uses its Ultra Durable VGA set of components on this video card to customize the PCB and components.  This video card uses better power phases, 2oz Copper PCB, solid capacitor, and Ultra Durable certified chokes and capacitors.  There is even a protection backplate installed to enhance the structure.  You can utilize GIGABYTE’s Engine software for overclocking support with GPU voltage support and controls to turn the 3D Active Fan function off or on, for example, if you don’t want the fans to sleep at lower temps.

This video card does require 1 8-pin power connector.  GIGABYTE recommends a 450W PSU.  The video card has three DisplayPorts and one HDMI.  Note that the specification sheet above is incorrect about the memory bandwidth, the memory bandwidth is 336GB/sec on this video card (14000 x (192/8)).  The length of this video card is 8.8 inches long, width is 4.8 inches and the height is 1.5 inches.  This is a compact video card.

Brent Justicehttps://www.thefpsreview.com
Former managing editor of GPUs at HardOCP for 18 years, Brent Justice has been reviewing computer components since the late 90s, educated in the art and method of the computer hardware review, he brings experience, knowledge, and hands-on testing with a gamer-oriented and hardware enthusiast perspective. You can follow him on Twitter - @Brent_Justice You can sub to his YouTube channel - Justice Gaming https://www.youtube.com/c/JusticeGamingChannel You can check out his computer builds on KIT - @BrentJustice https://kit.co/BrentJustice

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