The second card in the 4060 family of GPUs is on the horizon, with the RTX 4060 set to launch on July 29th. At $299, the RTX 4060 aims to bring high-quality gaming at 1080p and provide a compelling upgrade path for those still holding onto their aging Pascal and Turing GPUs. But does the performance - and the advantages that Ada Lovelace brings to the price point - make for a reason to upgrade?
Specifications
- Model Tested: ASUS Dual RTX 4060 OC - $299 MSRP
- Graphics Processing Clusters: 3
- Texture Processing Clusters: 12
- Streaming Multiprocessors: 24
- CUDA Cores: 3072
- Shader FLOPS: 15
- Tensor Cores (4th Generation): 96
- RT Cores (3rd Generation): 24
- RT FLOPS: 35
- Texture Units: 96
- ROP Units: 48
- Base Clock: 1830 MHz
- Boost Clock: 2460 MHz
- Memory Clock: 8500 MHz
- Memory Data Rate: 17 Gbps
- L1 Data Cache/Shared Memory: 3072 K
- L2 Cache Size: 24576 K
- Total Video Memory: 8 GB GDDR6
- Memory Interface: 128-bit
- Total Memory Bandwidth: 272 GB/s (453 GB/s Effective)
- Texture Rate (Bilinear): 236 GigaTexels/second
- Fabrication process: 4NM Nvidia Custom Process
- Transistor Count: 18.9 Billion
- I/O:
- 3 x DisplayPort
- 1 x HDMI
- Form Factor: Dual Slot
- Power Connectors: ASUS Dual RTX 4060 OC has single standard 8-pin PSU connector
- Required Power Supply: 550 Watts
- Total Graphics Power: 7W Idle, 11W AV1 Video Playback, 110W Average Gaming Power (AGP), 115 W Total Graphics Power (TGP)
First Thoughts And Design
The RTX 4060 doesn't have a Founder's Edition board like the RTX 3060 before it last gen, so the card we're reviewing today is the ASUS Dual RTX 4060 OC variant. As much as I've grown to love the sleek, modernist design of the 40-series, it was nice to see a return to the more "gameified" look I've loved over the years. Something in my caveman brain goes "that's going to be fast" when the GPU looks aggressive, for some reason. As such, the ASUS Dual RTX 4060 OC has a dual axial fan design surrounded by a semi-transparent black shroud that is emblazoned with the ASUS branding and aesthetic.
The two fans adorn the front of the card, providing the heat sink with a steady flow of cool air. Using an Axial fan design, ASUS states that its smaller fan hub allows more air to flow across the heatsink, keeping the RTX 4060 cool even under load.
A dual slot card, this makes for an easy upgrade for those who are looking to not need to replace their case like some of the early 40-series cards might have forced on some users. Thankfully too, at least the ASUS Dual RTX 4060 OC also has a standard 8-pin power connector, meaning you needn't worry about any adapters like the 30 or 40 series cards have required in the past.
At first glance, the RTX 4060 is simply just a shaved down RTX 4060 Ti 8GB. With fewer CUDA cores, 4th Generation Tensor cores and RT cores, the RTX 4060 still aims to provide an optimal 1080p gaming experience at just under $300. Also shaved down from the RTX 4060 Ti is its pool of L2 cache, crucial to helping the GPU overcome its 8GB GDDR6 VRAM limitations, even at 1080p.
As we mentioned in our RTX 4060 Ti 8GB review last month, even at 1080p 8GB of VRAM can be an limiting factor in the quality of a gaming experience. The RTX 4060 aims to get around this limitation - and the 128-bit bandwidth - through the use of its L2 cache. At 8 times the capacity of L2 cache versus the RTX 3060, the argument is that the extra cache reduces the traffic across the whole memory bus. Because, the L2 cache is larger, this should, as Nvidia argues, mean that the GPU will have to query the VRAM less, meaning a more efficient memory subsystem.
This is good, as it can help reduce the feeling that 8GB is limiting the GPU, especially in high-resolution gaming with ray tracing, where the BVH cost can be significant in some games. As a result of the L2 cache being so much higher compared to even the last generation Ampere cards (3MB on the RTX 3060 versus 24MB on the RTX 4060), the 4060 can reach an effective bandwidth of 453GB/s, even if it's only rated for 272 GB/s. It also has the added benefit of improving the GPU's power efficiency, which as the RTX 4060 is only rated for a max board power of 115W is rather insane.
The RTX 4060 brings the Ada Lovelace architecture to a GPU class at around the $300 price point, bringing the benefits of its 3rd generation RT cores, 4th generation Tensor cores, as well as its innovations in ray tracing performance thanks to Shader Execution Rendering. The RTX 4060 also leverages the latest updates with Nvidia's Deep Learning Super Sampling (DLSS) technology, namely frame generation (known colloquially as DLSS 3). RTX 4060 also brings the AV1 encoder for creators and streamers, as well as Nvidia Studio benefits to those looking to use their PC as a creative studio.
For more on the architecture itself, check out our RTX 4090 Founder's Edition review.
As Nvidia has moved down the GPU stack since releasing the RTX 4090, the RTX 4060 fits comfortably at the bottom, settling in at an MSRP of $299, despite a small OC on the card itself from ASUS. The RTX 3060, which this card replaces on the GPU stack, retailed for $329 at launch, though it can be found for less than $300 nowadays as GPU pricing has, thankfully, gotten much better in the wild after the pandemic saw astronomical increases for demand with little supply.
ASUS Dual RTX 4060 Gaming And Synthetic Benchmarks
Nvidia is keen to pit the RTX 4060 against the RTX 1060 and 2060 cards, as those are the obvious upgrade paths for gamers still playing at 1080p resolutions, which according to the Steam Hardware Survey, a large amount still do. With 64% of gamers on Steam (that opt into the survey) still gaming at 1080p, this upgrade to an RTX 4060 might be an attractive idea, especially if the cost of more expensive GPUs is a factor.
We put the ASUS Dual RTX 4060 through its paces in a series of gaming and synthetic benchmarks, testing an array of game engines at both 1080p and 1440p. We chose ray-tracing heavy games, looking at how the RTX 4060 handles heavy ray tracing loads, especially gen-on-gen, with and without DLSS 3's frame generation enabled.
Where we could, we used in-game benchmark tests (Hitman 3, Cyberpunk 2077 and Final Fantasy Endwalker) to provide the most consistent testing across each card. In games with no benchmark tool (New World and The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt Complete Edition), we would play a repeatable path through the game, such as a circuit around The Witcher's Oxenfurt, passing over the Pontar to highlight reflections, transparencies and more. New World saw us running around Prydwyn and the nearby jungle, killing monsters and trying to push the GPU as much as possible.
For the games with ray tracing, we tested them using reconstruction, as that is how real world gamers would be experiencing these technologies. For the AMD gpus in our suite, we used their AMD FidelityFX Super Resolution when possible, while Intel's own AI-driven XeSS was used when the game allowed. For games that allowed it, we also tested DLSS with and without frame generation to show the uplift when using the new technology.
Oxenfurt, passing over the Pontar to highlight reflections, transparencies, and more. When possible we reloaded the same save file each time to match time of day as close as we could in each pass.
Each one of the games we tested shows the ray tracing using some sort of reconstruction, whether it be DLSS for the Nvidia cards, FidelityFX Super Resolution for AMD and Intel's own AI-driven XeSS technology. We opted to test with these reconstructions used to show real-world performance as players would actively use ray tracing while gaming. If you're toggling on RT effects, chances are you're using some sort of reconstruction to make it playable at higher framerates.
While many users will be upgrading from either a GTX 1060 or RTX 2060 GPU, we unfortunately did not have any cards in our bench that we could test. As such, we tested the 30-series Nvidia cards, RX 6600 family of AMD, and the new kid on the block, the Intel A750 Limited Edition GPU.
You can check out our full post about our test bench and the various parts we’ve chosen to put GPUs and other PC hardware through their paces. Here it is broken down for quick reference:
Test Bench:
- CPU: Intel i9-13900K
- Motherboard: MSI MPG Carbon Wifi Z790
- RAM: XPG DDR5 32GB RAM @ 5200Mhz
- Cooling: Corsair H150i Elite LCD 360mm Liquid Cooler
- Storage: Intel 760p 2TB M.2 NVMe SSD; Samsung 970 EVO 1TB M.2 NVMe SSD
- PSU: Gigabyte P1200 80+ 1200W Platinum
- Case: ASUS ROG Strix Helios
Nvidia Cards Included:
AMD:
Intel:
ASUS Dual RTX 4060 Synthetic Benchmarks
As always we start with the synthetic benchmarks. While synthetics don't tell the whole story, they do give a snapshot into relative performance with the GPU. We used 3DMark's suite of synthetic tests, pushing the GPU with DX11, DX12 and ray traced workloads.
In FireStrike's 1080p test, at default settings we see the ASUS Dual RTX 4060 sitting behind both the RTX 3060 Ti and AMD's RX 7600 Reference board. Compared to the RTX 3060, the overall score here is a massive improvement, seeing a 32% increase in overall score with the RTX 4060.
TimeSpy plays out similarly, though we do see the RTX 4060 take the lead in combined score compared to the RX 7600 from AMD. However, the RTX 4060 still lags behind the RTX 4060 Ti 8GB and even last generation's RTX 3060 Ti. Interestingly enough, we also see better numbers from the less expensive Intel Arc A750 Limited Edition GPU, which currently runs for $239 on Amazon.
ASUS Dual RTX 4060 Gaming Benchmarks
As the RTX 4060 is squarly targeting 1080p players, we tested our games using max settings on each title at both 1080p and at 1440p, just to see what kind of headroom the GPU has. And honestly, we came away rather impressed by the numbers on display. If you're looking to game at max settings with current titles at 1080p, the RTX 4060 card can definitely fit the bill.
Games like Final Fantasy XIV is not a new game (it's starting to ramp up its 10th anniversary celebrations in fact), but it's still plenty attractive and one of the busiest MMOs out there. At 1080p and 1440p the ASUS Dual RTX 4060 outperformed both the AMD and Intel offerings, coming up short only against the RTX 4060 Ti 8GB and the RTX 3060 Ti, which both cards have an MSRP of a hundred dollars more.
Cyberpunk 2077 we see this trend somewhat reversed, with the RTX 4060 beating 3060 Ti by slim margin, though the RX 7600 Reference takes up second place in our testing at 1080p, beaten only by 4060 Ti 8GB. This carries over to 1440p, though the RTX 3060 Ti takes a slight lead over the RTX 4060, however, if you're looking at an upgrade from the base RTX 3060 GPU, the RTX 4060 provides a 20% boost in performance at 1440p.
New World seems to favor the RTX 40-series cards, beating out the competition by a wider margin here. At 119fps average at 1080p the RTX 4060 is 41% faster than our EVGA RTX 3060 XC Black 12GB model, while it's 33% faster than its nearest priced competition in the RX 7600. 1440p sees this trend continue, beating the RX 7600 by 35% (77fps for the 4060 to the 7600's 57fps average).
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt sees the ASUS Dual RTX 4060 continue to push past its AMD competitor with an 11% improvement in performance at 1080p. Compared to the RTX 3060, the gap is much wider, beating the Ampere card by 30% increase on average. Surprising, Intel's Arc A750 gets close enough to bring up fourth place in our bench, beaten only by the two 40 series cards and the RTX 3060 Ti - again, a card that retails at $399 (though nowadays it can be found for a bit cheaper).
Hitman 3 is a demanding title as well, with IO Interacive's latest in the franchise pushing visuals - especially ray tracing which we'll get to in a moment. At 1080p max settings we're seeing the ASUS Dual RTX 4060 average 154fps, 11% faster than the RX 7600's 138 FPS, and only 8% slower than the RTX 4060 Ti 8GB (a card that is 33% more money at retail pricing).
ASUS Dual RTX 4060 Ray Tracing Synthetic And Gaming Benchmarks
In Port Royal, the ASUS Dual RTX 4060 actually performed a but more middling than I expected given its leveraging Nvidia's 3rd generation RT cores. Taking up fourth place in our suite behind the RTX 4060 Ti 8GB, the RTX 3060 Ti and the Intel Arc A750 Limited Edition GPU, the RTX 4060 is still a generational improvement over the EVGA RTX 3060 Black XC (a 19% increase over the 3060). It also beats out each of AMD's cards, including its new RDNA 3 entry, the RX 7600.
We also tested the GPU in 3DMark's DLSS 3 test, showing the relative gain in performance when using DLSS 3's frame generation in ray tracing applications. We see a steady downward graph as we go down the RTX 40-series line in the test, with the RTX 4060 showing a respectable 49.11 FPS at 4K when using DLSS 3 in the test. Given that this is not a 4K card, it's impressive to even see that when using frame gen and sort of shows the point of frame gen - just giving performance to the user in high powered applications.
However, like we always say, synthetics only tell part of the story. How did it fare in our real world testing?
Ray tracing is where the 40-series shows its performance uplift over the competition. Its 3rd generation RT cores outstrip both the AMD and Intel GPUs, even when using reconstruction here, and provide a generational uplift over the RTX 30-series cards.
Compared to the RX 7600 Reference, the nearest new-gen competitor to the RTX 4060, we see the ASUS Dual RTX 4060 beat the AMD card with a 104% uplift at 1080p when using DLSS 2, while the AMD card utilizes its FSR 2 to help with the ray tracing load. Compared with RTX 3060, whose extra VRAM is definitely doing some heavy lifting here, RTX 4060 is still 44% faster. When DLSS 3 is turned on everything just gets blow away at 1080p, with the RTX 4060 reaching an average of 131 FPS in the benchmark with frame generation.
1440p continues this trend, with the RTX 4060 seeing a 100% increase in performance on average over the RX 7600. Compared with the RTX 4060 Ti, the cheaper RTX 4060 is only 12% slower - which again, the 4060 Ti costs 33% more at MSRP. This pricing gap is exacerbated when we see almost identical numbers here with frame generation turned on at 1440p with the RTX 4060 Ti 8GB netting 86fps average, while the ASUS Dual RTX 4060 sits at 85fps average - well within the margin of error here.
Hitman 3 and The Witcher 3 see similar trends continue, with the RTX 4060 blowing past all the AMD options in our bench (as well as the 30-series cards) even before frame generation is turned on. One thing I'll note too is that with our Witcher 3 testing, since I'm moving Geralt myself as opposed to a pre-defined benchmark, I can tell just how responsive DLSS 3 is in real time - and honestly it feels native. I'm not noticing any perceptible latency caused by the generated frames, and while there certainly must be some there, it just isn't perceptible for me.
ASUS Dual RTX 4060 Thermals, Power and Acoustics
115W is an impressively small limit, especially for a GPU that is meant to leverage ray tracing applications. Yet the RTX 4060 stays under that 115W load, though it does run up against in some of the heavier tasks. Games like Cyberpunk 2077 saw the RTX 4060 draw 112W of power peak, though this was when using its future-looking Path Tracing more (more on that in a bit).
Thermals never saw the GPU break a sweat either. Only once in my testing did I ever see the RTX 4060 crack 60 degrees Celsius (on Cyberpunk with path tracing enabled), and still it was just a peak of 60C. And even during all these benchmarks I never once heard the GPU ramp up, though I did see the fans spin quite aggressively when trying to keep the GPU cool during bouts of The Witcher 3 or Cyberpunk in my testing.
ASUS Dual RTX 4060 - Final Thoughts And Conclusion
So what does this all mean? For starters, it's a a great upgrade from the RTX 3060 at least if you're looking to trade up already. If you've been holding onto an older card and are looking at getting into 1080p gaming - especially with ray tracing, it's a no brainer if the $299 price tag doesn't shy you away.
The $299 price point, in a vaccuum, isn't bad either for the performance on offer. However, when you look at the landscape of 1080p gaming nowadays, seeing AMD's RX 7600 starting at $269, and Intel's impressive offering of the A750 at $239 makes the 4060 price feel a bit on the higher side. This is despite a GPU that, in our testing, broadly out performs both in both rasterized games and ray tracing.
Generationally, the RTX 4060 performs on average 6% faster at 1080p without ray tracing compared to the EVGA RTX 3060 Black XC. When ray tracing was turned on (DLSS without frame gen enabled) that percentage increased to 34% on average better compared to 3060. This is for a card that, at the time of this writing, is about the same price you can find a 3060 on the market right now.
What good GPU generations should do is give better performance gen over gen, but also provide those architectural features at all levels of the GPU stack that make that upgrade particularly compelling. This is especially so for the lower-cost cards, as people spending $300 on a GPU are looking for that value, as well as a taste of the higher-end performance that new generation brings with a tighter budget.
The RTX 4060 does this, specifically with DLSS 3's frame generation. Remember my mention of Cyberpunk 2077 using its path tracing ray tracing feature? Without DLSS 3 this wouldn't be playable - and that's important to understand. Path tracing is legit forward-looking tech and the cutting edge of ray tracing, something that will only continue to be refined and improved on as more and more games start implementing the tech. Yet it's incredibly demanding, even on behemoths like the RTX 4090.
Being able to play Cyberpunk 2077 with full path tracing, ultra settings at 1080p and get a responsive 85fps average (all while staying under 155W of power) is insane to think about. Let that sink in - a $299 is path tracing and is a fully playable experience in the end as well.
This to me is also the compelling argument when weighing whether to upgrade from your previous GPU to the 4060 or buy a similarly priced console. These forward-looking features just aren't available on a console like the Xbox Series S, which can't play Cyberpunk 2077 with any ray tracing features (or above 30fps for that matter) as of right now.
The thing to keep in mind is that as DLSS 3's frame generation ages, it's going to get better as has been proven since DLSS was released with the 20-series GPUs. As I've mentioned in a few reviews now, the lower and middle-of-the-stack cards will feel the benefits of frame generation the most: and that holds true here as well.
The Witcher 3 feels and looks incredible to play with its full RT Ultra preset using DLSS 3, and newer games like Diablo 4 are fluid and responsive, each enemy crunching to the ground with every swing of my blade.
I do still have a concern, though, with the 8GB of VRAM, especially when the card its replacing, the RTX 3060, launched with 12GB of VRAM. 8GB can start to feel limiting, especially when ray tracing as the BVH structure will take as much VRAM as it needs, regardless of resolution. In games like The Witcher 3, I could see an extra 2GB of VRAM being allocated when using its RT mode, and it makes me wonder as we move into more and more advanced games how much this 8GB will hold up.
We are talking about a class of user who holds onto their GPUs for years. $300 is a lot of money, full stop. At this price point especially as most users just don't have a ton of disposable income - especially when accounting for inflation in our daily lives right now. Will 8GB now be enough to comfortably carry a user through the next few years, even with frame gen helping to eke out more performance in some titles? Time can only tell.
Pricing versus its competitors might be a negative for some users, but personally the value add of DLSS 3 makes up for it in my opinion. Additionally, we still have the RTX 4060 Ti 16GB looming over the horizon sometime next month if VRAM is a concern for you, though the GPU is in a different price class compared to this one. If ray tracing isn't a big draw for you - AMD's RDNA 2 cards are a worth a look, especially as many have dropped in price right now like the RX 6750 XT or even the RX 6700 XT if you can find one- both quality 1440p performers.
At the end of the day, though, the ASUS RTX 4060 is a compelling upgrade path at its price point. At $299 it's one of the more reasonably priced Nvidia cards in recent memory, and it brings the advantages of the Ada Lovelace architecture to bear here. Features such as DLSS 3's frame generation is straight magic, making experiences usually reserved for the higher class cards available down the GPU stack. Seriously, path tracing on a sub-$300 card is still just insane to me. It's an incredibly performant 1080p card that can also eke into the 1440p range if you're looking for that extra pixel count, though VRAM will increasingly become a limiting factor there.
If you've been holding onto your existing 60-series card from generations past, or are looking to upgrade from just an older GPU period, the ASUS Dual RTX 4060 is worth the look.
Full Disclosure: The product discussed was provided by PR for the purposes of this review.
