Over the past few months, we’ve seen a flurry of graphics card being release by Nvidia. Last month it was the GTX 1660 Ti, so I couldn’t believe it when I heard they’ve just announced the GTX 1660 this month. The GTX 1660 uses a GPU that’s very similar to the GTX 1660 Ti, and features Nvidia’s Turing architecture (used on their RTX series), but lacks the essential Tenor and RT cores for ray-tracing. So in other words … both the GTX 1660 Ti and GTX 1660 do not support ray-tracing.
Oh but wait! Nvidia just recently announced that all GTX 10 and 16 series can support ray-tracing via DXR in their next driver update. Confusing? … YES! More on this topic another day. Anyway, let’s get back to the review …
Today, we’ll be taking a quick look at the MSI GeForce GTX 1660 Gaming X (6GB GDDR5) Graphics Card. The CPU is overclocked to boost speed of 1860 MHz (default 1785 MHz) and comes with 1408 CUDA Cores and 6GB GDDR5 ram, with a memory speed of 8 Gbps on a 192-bit memory bus.
The Gaming X series from MSI does offer some extra features not found on their AMOR or Ventus series. Take for example the brushed metal backplate, Mystic Light Sync RGB lighting and their TWIN FROZR 7 cooling solution. These features will give this card something that mainstream gamers might want.
Here’s a quick comparison between the GeForce RTX 20 series, GTX 1660 Ti and the GTX 1660 (default clock speeds)…
| GeForce RTX 2070 | GeForce RTX 2060 | GeForce GTX 1660 Ti | GeForce GTX 1660 | GeForce GTX 1060 | |
| Architecture | Turing | Turing | Turing | Turing | Pascal |
| CUDA Cores | 2304 | 1920 | 1536 | 1408 | 1280 |
| Frame Buffer | 8GB GDDR6 | 6GB GDDR6 | 6GB GDDR6 | 6GB GDDR5 | 6GB GDDR5 |
| Base Clock Speed | 1410 MHz | 1365 MHz |
1500 MHz | 1530 MHz | 1506 MHz |
| Boost Clock Speed | 1620 MHz | 1680 MHz | 1770 MHz | 1785 Mhz | 1708 MHz |
| Giga Rays/s | 6 | 5 | N/A | N/A | N/A |
| Memory Speed | 14 Gbps | 14 Gbps | 12 Gbps | 8 Gbps | 8 Gbps |
| Memory Bus | 256-bit | 192-bit | 192-bit | 192-bit | 192-bit |
| Memory Bandwidth | 448 Gb/s | 336 Gb/s | 288 Gb/s | 192 Gb/s | 192 Gb/s |
| Power | 175W | 160W | 130W | 130W | 120W |
| DX12 Support | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Vulkan API | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Ray Tracing | Yes | Yes | No | No | No |
We’ll start by saying thanks to Hornington Computers for supplying the review sample. For those who don’t know who MSI is, here’s a little blurb taken from their website …
As a world leading gaming brand, MSI is the most trusted name in gaming and eSports. We’ve dedicated countless hours and committed numerous resources to the eSports community to support the world’s most aspiring and best gamers and use their knowledge and expertise in our products in return. MSI integrated all gamers’ aspirational functions in its gaming rigs, eliminating the tedious trial and error by themselves and pushing the performance beyond limits. The determination to surpass past achievements has made MSI a ‘True Gaming’ brand with gaming spirit throughout the industry!
Dedicated to gamer-driven innovation, MSI leverages its remarkable R&D strengths to craft top-notch, well-acclaimed notebook PCs, graphics cards, motherboards, and desktop PCs. Now, MSI GAMING Series receives gamers’ unanimous acclaim and the Pro Series has an excellent reputation for quality and durability. All these distinctive products have made MSI a forerunner in the high-end market. Also adding to the lineup are cloud servers, tailor-made IPCs, intelligent robotic appliances and human-centric vehicle electronics that further demonstrate MSI’s strengths and endeavors in artificial intelligence, commercial and IOT(Internet of Things) markets.
We already reviewed the GeForce GTX 1660 Ti from Zotac and of course MSI. Both graphics card proved to be great performers beating the GeForce GTX 1070 and sometimes even matching the GTX 1070 Ti. So what will the GeForce GTX 1660 give us?
With a reduced number of CUDA cores and using lower spec GDDR5 ram, I not expecting enthusiast gaming performance. I’m hoping the performance should be about the same as the older GTX 1060. Enough talk. Let’s start by taking a look at the specifications and features in our next page …
You can buy the MSI GeForce GTX 1660 Gaming X
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