Conclusion
Final words and verdict
Gigabyte offers a good factory tweaked product here. The performance while easily is tweaked higher heights that other premium AIB cards also offer. The cooling is fine and while not absolutely silent, it is at a normal level. And that is what the MSRP products are all about. The looks are okay, there's not much RGB implemented aside from the top Gigabyte logo. Anyone that hasn't upgraded towards a bit of an affordable mainstream solution might be compelled and attracted towards the GeForce GTX 1660. If you come from the 900 series say a GTX 970, then 1660 might be a viable alternative. The cards will be a notch faster than the 1060 6GB series at roughly the same or even lower price. The 1660 non-Ti, however, is clearly positioned against the competitions Radeon RX 590. The basic models will start at 219 USD and we expect prices in the 199 pound and 229 EUROS range here in the EU (depending on the country). I am however afraid that the pricing on the Gaming OC is too far fetched at roughly 270 EUR at the moment (at least here in the Netherlands).
Aesthetics
As stated the card does not come with much fancy RGB options, just a logo lit at the top side and then the sizable cooler makes this product look as to what it is, rather big. If you look at the photo above you can see the aluminum fins, it would be nice to have these colored in black. The triple fan cooler has nice dark aesthetics. The casing of the card including a backplate, it's all plastic though. So overall the card is not hyper fancy, but an okay looking card.
Cooling & acoustic levels
The card tops out at roughly 65 Degrees C while gaming. So that's not bad at all, the acoustics I'd rate as normal, we doubt you'll ever hear the card noticeably enough once mounted into a chassis but it wasn't silent. In idle the fans do not spin btw. We've heard very little noticeable coil whine. But I do want to note that any graphics card at a high-enough FPS can make some coil whine.
Overclocking
Much like any NVIDIA product these days, we've been able to push roughly 10 to 15% extra perf out of the card compared to the reference card. Both traditional overclocking, as well as the OC Scanner, reached roughly that level. The combination of memory, power and voltage settings will bring you a proper overclock. Once you've applied it, you get a few percent more perf. This card is memory bandwidth limited, so tweaking there can really boost your FPS.
Concluding
It is a nice performing card. However, at the above 250 EUR/USD marker the reality the price is rather steep. The GeForce GTX 1660 certainly addresses the issue of offering a more compelling product. So who is going to step up from the GTX 1000 series? Well, anyone with a GTX 1050 but not 1060. So perhaps the GeForce GTX 1660 is an interesting enough card for GeForce GTX 960/970 owners that are looking to upgrade, but only if the price is right. The baseline performance with the factory tweak is sweet as well and it did also tweak really nicely. The product is fast enough for any day gaming up-to, the Full HD monitor resolution domain of 1920x1080. The 6 GB of graphics memory seen over 8 GB really isn't a hindrance either as long as you stick to that resolution and sure, Quad HD as well. Looking at it from a competition point of view, the card positions itself against the Radeon RX 580 and even 590 cards. Once again please let me reiterate, the Raytracing and AI feature like DLSS, of course, have been stripped away. The product as-is is good, the power consumption of the 1660 series, by the way, is really good. If you are in the market for a long overdue upgrade coming from that 900 series, this could be it. I'm included to steer you towards the 1660 Ti though, but that product only makes sense under a 299 USD/EUR price range. The product needs a bit of a price cut to be more market relevant, say 229 EUR/USD.
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