AMD Radeon RX Vega 8 (Ryzen 2000/3000) vs NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 Ti (Desktop) vs NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 Ti Max-Q

AMD Radeon RX Vega 8 (Ryzen 2000/3000)

The AMD Radeon RX Vega 8 is an integrated GPU for notebooks. It is used for the Ryzen 5 APUs, which were launched in the end of 2017. The GPU is based on the Vega architecture (5th generation GCN) and has 8 CUs (= 512 of the 704 shaders) clocked at up to 1100 MHz (Ryzen 5 2500U). The performance depends on the configured TDP (12-25 W at launch), the clocks, the cooling, and the memory configuration). The GPU should benefit from fast dual-channel DDR4-2400 RAM (contrary to DDR4-2133 single-channel, which is also possible).

The Vega architecture offers some improvements over the Polaris generation and now supports DirectX 12 Feature Level 12_1. More information is available in our dedicated article about the Raven Ridge architecture.

AMD's reference design GPU is sitting between the GeForce 940MX / Radeon Pro 450 and GeForce MX150 / Radeon Pro 555. It can handle smooth gameplay in simple titles like League of Legends (med), Dota 2 (low), Overwatch (low), CS:GO (med), and Quake Champions (high) in 720p up to 1080p according to AMD.

Thanks to the 14nm process and clever power-saving features, the power consumption is comparatively low (according to AMD), so the graphics card can also be used for slim and light notebooks.

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 Ti (Desktop)

The Nvidia GeForce GTX 1660 Ti is a powerful, mid-tier, Turing-based, desktop GPU. The GTX 1660 Ti relies on the TU116 chip with 1536 shader units, 48 ROPs, 96 TMUs and a 192-bit-wide memory bus (clocked at 6 GHz, effectively 12 GHz, bandwidth: up to 288 GB/s). The notebook version of the GTX 1660 Ti  is 10 to 20 % slower due to a lower TDP.

The TU116 chip and other Turing-based GPUs are produced using the 12-nm manufacturing process. However, the GeForce GTX 1660 Ti does not offer the latest features such as DLSS (Deep Learning Super Sampling) and Real Time Ray Tracing. Nevertheless, there are some architectural improvements when it comes to floating point and integer performance. These operations can now be carried out simultaneously. Other notable features include Adaptive Shading, unified cache, DisplayPort 1.4, HDMI 2.0b, HDR, Simultaneous Multi-Projection (SMP) as well as H.265 encoding and decoding (PlayReady 3.0).

At Full HD resolution, the GeForce GTX 1660 Ti performs somewhat worse than the GeForce GTX 1070, but significantly better than the GeForce GTX 1060. Therefore, it is best-suited for Full HD gaming. However, it can run less demanding titles in 1440p.

The energy consumption of the GeForce GTX 1660 Ti amounts to 120 watts. The older GeForce GTX 1060 also has a TDP of 120 watts.

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 Ti Max-Q