Introduction
Today we have an opportunity to take a good look at the brand new GIGABYTE GeForce RTX 4060 Low Profile OC video card (GV-N4060 OC-8GL Rev. 1.0) which was just launched finally in retail. This is the smallest video card we have reviewed to date and the smallest half-height GeForce RTX 4060 GPU-based video card we have seen. We first saw this video card in person while visiting GIGABYTE at its Fast Track Gen X: Speed Simplified event in San Diego this past summer 2023. Ironically, a banana was used to compare its size as you can see in the picture below.
This video card is significantly smaller than the average video card these days and we are about to run it through our gaming suite and also overclock it. The main target of this Low Profile GeForce RTX 4060 is 1080p gaming and the size of this video card makes it ideal for smaller form factor builds or a media PC. As we mentioned in our original article, this is GIGABYTE’s first half-height video card since the GeForce RTX 2070. GIGABYTE saw an opening in the market to target small form factor systems. Let’s see if size matters.
GIGABYTE RTX 4060 Offerings
GIGABYTE, makers of numerous PC components, produce a large number of NVIDIA (and AMD) based video cards. The GeForce RTX 4060 launched on 29 June 2023. There was no Founders Edition card. GIGABYTE has no fewer than 9 varieties of this video card listed on their website. The top shelf unit is the Aorus Elite, followed by the GAMING, AERO, EAGLE WINDFORCE, D6, and finally the Low Profile. Each of these cards has an overclocked version or is simply overclocked as the only version. The Elite has the highest overclock and the most prominent RGB. The Windforce has two fans, the D6 a single fan and the Low Profile is a triple fan offering, but by far the smallest.
The GIGABYTE GeForce RTX 4060 OC Low Profile features not only a diminutive size but of course, a custom, specifically designed heatsink and 3X WINDFORCE Fans 50mm. The PCB is fashioned after GIGABYTE’s Ultra Durable brand. The video card comes from the factory with an overclock of 15MHz, 2475MHz versus 2460MHz in reference models. This was the first Low Profile RTX 4060 to launch at the time. We have an excellent overview of the RTX 4060 in the launch article here.
Briefly, the specifications of the GeForce RTX 4060 GPU are: 3 Graphics Processing Clusters, 12 Texture Processing Clusters, and 24 Streaming Multiprocessors. What this means is that the GeForce RTX 4060 has 3,072 CUDA Cores, 96 Texture Units, 48 ROPs, 96 (4th Gen) Tensor Cores, and 24 (3rd Gen) RT Cores. The reference has a Base Clock of 1830MHz and a Boost Clock of 2460MHz. Memory consists of 8GB of GDDR6 at 17GHz on a 128-bit memory bus. This provides 272GB/s of actual memory bandwidth. It has 24MB of L2 cache. The TGP is 115W for this video card, but the average gaming Wattage is only 110W. This runs on a PCIe Gen 4 x8 PCIe lanes connection. The required PSU is 450W. New features include DLSS 3 Frame Generation and AV1 encoding support.
Note that our testing unit was a previously opened and tested retail packaged video card from GIGABYTE. The MSRP of the reference specification GeForce RTX 4060 is $299. The GIGABYTE GeForce RTX 4060 OC Low Profile 8G video card is currently listed at $324.99 on Newegg and Amazon. Please make sure to check out the pricing widget for the latest prices. The listed warranty is 3 years.
The GIGABYTE GeForce RTX 4060 OC Low Profile 8G
The GIGABYTE GeForce RTX 4060 OC Low Profile is a fairly bare-bones video card but in a good way. The front of the card has a full-length copper heat pipe heat sink, of the direct contact flavor making direct contact with the GPU. It is custom-made due to the small size of the card. Three GIGABYTE WINDFORCE 50mm fans cool the heat sink. The top shroud is full cover and plastic.
There is no backplate however the Ultra Durable process is automated so there will be less chance of snagging your fingers on solder points. Notice that the fan cowls are slightly raised to aid cooling and maybe reduce noise. The GIGABYTE GeForce RTX 4060 OC Low Profile 8G uses GIGABYTE’s Ultra Durable technologies, with Lower RDS(on) MOSFETs, Metal Chokes, and Lower ESR Solid Capacitors.
We see that despite the small size, there are still two DP 1.4a and two HDMI 2.1a ports on the front of the card to support 4 displays, which is impressive. There are two I/O plates supplied with this video card. One is quite a small low-profile bracket and the other is a standard front I/O plate so you have options for installation and form factor.
Speaking of size, the GIGABYTE GeForce RTX 4060 OC Low Profile measures just 7×2 x 1¼ inches and weighs in at 11.7 ounces (182mm card length), (L=182 W=69 H=40 mm). To further impress the small size, the flooring the card sits on in these photos is 5.5 inches wide. You can compare our test card to a GIGABYTE GeForce RTX 4070 Ti GAMING OC in a couple of the photos. Additional power is supplied by one 8-pin PCIe connector. With a Total Board Power of 115 Watts, the recommended PSU is 450 Watts.
