GALAX RTX 2060 offers impressive performance without breaking the bank

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]When looking for a graphics card, we scour the internet and offline retail shops for the best deals in the market. NVIDIA’s latest graphics cards with Turing Architecture offer the latest and future-proof technologies albeit with apparent high cash outlay.

RTX-powered GPUs have a lot to offer, including ray tracing via DXR capabilities and DLSS, which some current and future titles support. These technologies, however, are still in the development stage and it takes knowledge of technologies behind it to really appreciate what these cards offer. (If you want to know more about this, NVIDIA offers in-depth discussion on their website.)

Buying an NVIDIA RTX GPU is investing to a developing technology

Consumers, especially, DIY PC Builders, are hungry for new technologies but the question of whether to invest now or only when more games support DXR and DLSS is their current biggest dilemma.  As of today, there are only a handful of games that support ray tracing like Battlefield V , Metro Exodus and Shadow of the Tomb Raider, to name a few. For consumers wanting to experience ray tracing, shelling out something that costs more than a GTX 1080 Ti may be too much. However, with the availability of RTX 2060 like the one we recently tried, the Galax RTX 2060 6GB, investing in a GPU that offers impressive performance and support to latest technologies may now be easier than ever before.

NVIDIA and Galax Philippines sent us a unit a few weeks ago and we got to play our favorite games in various settings, including DXR and DLSS on some of our games.

GALAX RTX 2060 Specifications and compelling reason to buy

Galax’s RTX 2060 offers 1920 Cuda Cores that give it significantly good processing power and speed. It features standard 14Gbps memory speed at 6GB memory configuration. Unlike its 20-series counterparts, RTX 2060 offers the lowest at 192-bit GDDR6.

In terms of the display support, it can take 1 DisplayPort, 1 HDMI, and a Dual-Link DVI-D. At maximum, provided that you are you going to have all ports used – including the ones on your integrated GPU – you can use up to 4 to 5 monitors.

Galax’s RTX 2060 is incomparable in terms of performance to GTX 1060. It can easily pit itself against GTX 1070 with its number of Cuda Cores albeit with higher TDP and more expensive due to its ray tracing capabilities.

From a consumer’s perspective, if you are planning to upgrade from a GTX 900 series and wanting to experience ray tracing in games, consider Galax RTX 2060 as your starting point. In case you’re getting a GTX 16-series, RTX 2060 offers a significantly better bump in terms of specifications and theoretically performance.

Gaming Benchmark Methodology

Our methodology: we provide basic benchmarking results by recording min, max and average fps of our gameplay in varying settings. We played the following games:

• Battlefield V
  • Ultra Settings, DX12, 1920×1080, DXR and DLSS Enabled, VSYNC Off, TAA High, HBAO
  • High Settings, DX12, 1920×1080, DXR and DLSS Disabled, VSYNC Off, TAA High, HBAO
• Shadow of the Tomb Raider
  • Custom, Normal Texture, 1920×1080, DXR, RTX and DLSS Enabled, Ray Traced Shadow Medium, VSYNC Off
  • Custom, Normal Texture, 1920×1080, DXR, RTX and DLSS Disabled, VSYNC Off
• Division 2
  • Custom High Settings, DX12, 1920×1080, VSYNC Off, 8X AF
  • Custom Medium Settings, DX12, 1920×1080, VSYNC Off, 8X AF
• Anthem (NVDIA DLSS Limited to 2560×1440 or 3840×2160)
  • Ultra Settings, 1920×1080, HBAO, DOF On, VSYNC Off
  • High Settings, 1920×1080, HBAO, DOF On, VSYNC Off
• Far Cry 5
  • High Settings, 1920×1080, TAA, VSYNC Off
  • Ultra Settings, 1920×1080, TAA, VSYNC Off

Our test bench:

• CPU: Intel – Core i7-7700K 4.2 GHz Quad-Core Processor
• Motherboard: Asus – MAXIMUS IX HERO ATX LGA1151 Motherboard
• RAM: Corsair – Vengeance LED 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4-2666 Memory
• Power Supply: SeaSonic – 750 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply
• GPU: GALAX RTX 2060

We benchmarked the aforementioned games with the best of our ability and with the available tools we have at our disposal. If you’re looking for additional information such as power draw and extensive temperature test, I recommend that you visit the reviews from Back2Gaming.

Benchmark Results

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[/vc_wp_text][vc_column_text]As one of the first triple A games that showcases and features DXR and DLSS, Battlefield V excels in various fields. Given the right settings, ray tracing on Battlefield V using Galax RTX 2060 give the game lifelike graphics and surreal gameplay experience.

NVIDIA, using its proprietary application for automatic optimization – GeForce Experience, suggested that we enable DXR Raytrace and set it to medium with GALAX RTX 2060.  While this was the case, we pushed the GPU further and set it to both Ultra Settings and High Settings respectively. This way, we would know the extent of playability of the game at the highest possible settings with DXR and DLSS enabled. At maximum settings, Battlefield V was barely playable with an average fps of 36 fps. With optimized settings enabled, with DXR enabled and DLSS disabled, the game is highly playable with an average fps of 62 fps. With DXR enabled, the performance is likely the same.[/vc_column_text][vc_gallery type=”image_grid” images=”53672,53673,53674″ img_size=”large”][/vc_tta_section][vc_tta_section title=”Shadow of the Tomb Raider” tab_id=”1554455763532-61743cb8-affc”][vc_wp_text]

[/vc_wp_text][vc_column_text]Shadow of the Tomb Raider gave the series a whole new perspective and experience. With DLSS and raytraced shadows enabled, the game looked fantastic and beautiful. With DLSS enabled, performance bump was significant even with raytraced shadows are enabled. If you’re paying attention to details, the difference between RTX disabled and RTX enabled is like day and night in terms of rendering shadows. While the implementation is currently limited to it, the future of raytracing is bright[/vc_column_text][vc_gallery type=”image_grid” images=”53679,53680,53681,53682″ img_size=”large”][/vc_tta_section][vc_tta_section title=”Anthem” tab_id=”1554455652378-6b99f3be-392b”][vc_wp_text]

[/vc_wp_text][vc_column_text]As one of the disappointing game releases this year, Anthem’s success was marred with poor storytelling, poor game mechanics and bad optimization issues. The world of Anthem is beautiful, especially at ultra graphics settings; but DXR and DLSS are not fully implemented in the game. With Galax RTX 2060, we cannot enabled DLSS at 1920 x 1080 resolution.

The performance was pretty dismal too, and we believe that the game’s poor optimization is main culprit. The game is crawling at 33-34 fps at either high and ultra settings.[/vc_column_text][vc_gallery type=”image_grid” images=”53683,53684″ img_size=”large”][/vc_tta_section][vc_tta_section title=”Division 2″ tab_id=”1554455539247-efd2fc1d-317e”][vc_wp_text]

[/vc_wp_text][vc_column_text]As one of this year’s most anticipated looter-shooter, Division 2 promises rich gaming experience with heavy emphasis on looting, PVE, PVP and story.  We played more than 60 hours of this game, and spent around 10 hours of our time playing it using Galax RTX 2060.

Division 2 is one of the most optimized third-person shooter games we have recently played and Galax’s GPU handled this pretty well even at maximum settings. We experienced a few issues with DX12 enabled like random stutters and crashes, but we recon that it’s because of the 2 concurrent applications we’re running in the background to monitor the GPU’s performance: Fraps and MSI Afterburner. We never had issues while playing the game with DX11.[/vc_column_text][vc_gallery type=”image_grid” images=”53676,53677,53678″ img_size=”large”][/vc_tta_section][vc_tta_section title=”Far Cry 5″ tab_id=”1554455718459-41996aea-048f”][vc_wp_text]

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Verdict

At PhP23,500, GALAX RTX 2060 offers impressive performance without breaking the bank. If you’re in the market for an entry-level GPU with ray tracing support, consider Galax’s offer. It is important to keep in mind though that ray tracing technology is a technology that is still under development, and the features being introduced to games are slowly being rolled out. If you want to embrace and be part in this stage of development, you’re better off getting this than a GTX 1070.

Giancarlo Viterbo

Website

Giancarlo Viterbo is a Filipino Technology Journalist, blogger and Editor of gadgetpilipinas.net, He is also a Geek, Dad and a Husband. He knows a lot about washing the dishes, doing some errands and following instructions from his boss on his day job. Follow him on twitter: @gianviterbo and @gadgetpilipinas.