The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 660 Review: GK106 Fills Out The Kepler Family
by Ryan Smith on September 13, 2012 9:00 AM ESTSynthetics
As always we’ll also take a quick look at synthetic performance to see if NVIDIA’s core configuration has had any impact on basis performance metrics. We’re expecting to see performance very close to the GTX 660 Ti, due to its nearly identical ROP/L2/memory configuration. We’ll start with 3DMark Vantage’s Pixel Fill test.
3DMark Vantage’s pixel fill test likes memory bandwidth and ROP performance in that order, which makes these results a bit odd. With identical memory bandwidth between them we’d expect the GTX 660 and GTX 660 Ti to at least be tied here, if not a slight lead for the GTX 660 thanks to its higher ROP performance. Instead the GTX 660 trails the GTX 660 Ti by a slight amount, an outcome we can’t explain at this time.
Our texture fillrate benchmark on the other hand sees a large gap between the GTX 660 and GTX 660 Ti, which is what we would expect from the loss of SMXes.
Our third theoretical test is the set of settings we use with Microsoft’s Detail Tessellation sample program out of the DX11 SDK
Despite the loss of SMXes (and thereby Polymorph engines), our tessellation benchmarks don’t show any kind of significant difference between the GTX 660 and GTX 660 Ti. We’ve been finding this benchmark to be surprisingly sensitive to ROP performance and memory bandwidth on Kepler, and these results back that finding.
Our final theoretical test is Unigine Heaven 2.5, a benchmark that straddles the line between a synthetic benchmark and a real-world benchmark as the engine is licensed but no notable DX11 games have been produced using it yet.
Despite its advanced nature, Heaven isn’t particularly sensitive to the loss of shader and texturing performance, as signified by the performance loss of less than 10% for the GTX 660.
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CeriseCogburn - Wednesday, September 19, 2012 - link
Hey Gilligan, stop ragging.Gastec - Thursday, November 15, 2012 - link
Nvidia cards are for rich people. ATI/AMD cards are for poor people. Just like rich people drive Mercedes and poor people drive american cars. Is that enough for you want more? I was poor and I had to buy a ATI card. Now I'm not poor anymore so I'm going to buy a Nvidia card in December. Quod erat demonstrandum. Now fuck off!Model192 - Friday, December 7, 2012 - link
I have a Corvette and I buy AMD. Guess I'm double retarded? Or does the Corvette not quite fit into your theory about being poor and buying AMD/ATI.nerrrd - Wednesday, March 13, 2013 - link
corvettes are american cars...stm1185 - Thursday, September 13, 2012 - link
Techpowerup includes more games where AMD has a slight edge, but does that edge make a difference in those games? I'd argue no because frame rate in a console port adventure game like Alan Wake is not a big deal.Also face it most of those 2012 games are mediocre. Who is spending 60 hours a week playing Sniper Elite or Max Payne? No one, but for SC2, BF3, Skyrim, they do, hell some guys have to by contract!
7870 is not a better card, it's about equal, or worse depending on what you play. For a competitive gamer, the GTX660 is the better card, because it's better for BF3, and it's better for SC2 (Amazingly so, best SC2 card!).
RussianSensation - Thursday, September 13, 2012 - link
Data does not back up your claimsBF3 - factory overclocked 660 trades blows with a factory overclocked 7870
http://www.hardocp.com/article/2012/09/13/asus_gef...
BF3 - barely any difference (but comparing a reference 660 it doesn't win either)
http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/ASUS/GeForce_GT...
Skyrim - 7870 wins
http://www.hardocp.com/article/2012/09/13/asus_gef...
Skyrim - 7870 wins
http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/ASUS/GeForce_GT...
Add mods to Skyrim and 7870 wins by 20-40%
http://www.computerbase.de/artikel/grafikkarten/20...
Also, you are discounting performance in 12-15 games and just focusing on the games you think are most important. That's your opinion. Starcraft 2 for example is playable on a GTX560/HD6870 without any problems. Plus in a strategy game you only need 30-45 fps for it to feel smooth and modern cards get 70-100 fps! So really your point about SC2 is hardly relevant.
The reason we look at more games is because not everyone spends 200 hours a month playing BF3 only.
Overall, 660 is not any better (actually a slower card unless you consider factory overclocked versions)
http://www.computerbase.de/artikel/grafikkarten/20...
stm1185 - Thursday, September 13, 2012 - link
So Anandtech is lying then? Those numbers I see right above this post are false?Margalus - Thursday, September 13, 2012 - link
sorry, but you lost all credibility by linking hardocp. That is the worst hardware site on the internet. They gave up all premises of being unbiased and fair years ago.ninjaquick - Thursday, September 13, 2012 - link
? They compare OC parts with OC parts, rather than average out the OC parts results and place them against stock parts.Different systems have different results, Anandtech didn't lie, AFAICT. nobody has fudged results (esp. not w1zzard)
formulav8 - Thursday, September 13, 2012 - link
No cred lost. Your opinion only. Hardocp simply uses different methods of comparison. Some like it, some don't.