MSI GeForce GTX 1660

With the GeForce GTX 1660, NVIDIA is clearly attacking AMD's Radeon RX 590 offering. The GTX 1660 is based on the same TU116 graphics processor we saw on the GTX 1660 Ti not too long ago. Besides shader count and clock frequencies, the biggest difference between both cards is certainly that the GTX 1660 uses GDDR5 memory, while the GTX 1660 Ti uses GDDR6. Unlike other GeForce RTX "Turing" GPUs, TU116 does not feature acceleration for RTX real-time raytracing or DLSS because the specialized hardware consumes a significant portion of the die area on other Turing GPUs, which increases manufacturing cost significantly.

MSI's GeForce GTX 1660 Gaming X comes with the company's signature TwinFrozr cooler, which is dual-slot, dual-fan cooler. The cooler keeps the card at great temperatures of 67°C and uses well-balanced fan settings. With 30 dBA in gaming, noise levels are the lowest of all the cards tested today and better than any RX 590 you can find. MSI was also kind enough to include the highly popular idle-fan-off feature, which turns off the fans completely during idle, Internet browsing, or light gaming. The quiet cooler is no doubt an achievement due to Turing's amazing energy efficiency, which means less heat gets produced, so weaker (= cheaper) coolers can handle the heat output with ease. MSI's Gaming X is also the only card tested today that includes a metal backplate, which definitely helps improve the look and feel of the product. RGB lighting is included, too, for those who like it.