GIGABYTE GeForce RTX 3060

Gigabyte has crafted an incredible graphics card here, and what I really didn’t expect is that it would go head to head with the much more expensive and more heavily engineered MSI RTX 3060 Gaming X Trio we’re also testing this week. In most benchmarks, it actually performed better by a tiny fraction. Admittedly, the performance is so close, it’s basically a photo finish in every benchmark. However, that just shows how well-refined Gigabyte have got their coolers; it’s able to max out this card with minimal effort.

The sum of Nvidia's changes result in partner cards offering really solid performance at FHD and generally decent numbers at QHD. RTX 3060 is around 20 per cent faster than an RTX 2060 and twice the speed of the much older GTX 1060. In particular to the review card, Gigabyte's Gaming OC carries on the good work by building a solid model around the GA106 GPU. Decent in design, generally quiet and overclocked to boot, it's a decent choice if you can find availability this side of Easter.

Die Vision-Serie von Gigabyte zeigt sich unter den Grafikkarten-Serien optisch deutlich schlichter als so manch andere Modellreihe. Sie ist in Sachen RGB-Beleuchtung nicht ganz so bunt, das Kühlsystem ist weniger schnittig und insgesamt in einem eher seltenen silber-weißen Farbton gehalten. Mit der Gigabyte GeForce RTX 3060 Vision OC haben wir nun den kleinsten und jüngsten Serienvertreter bei uns im Test. Wie sich das Dual-Slot-Modell in der Praxis schlägt, das erfährt man in diesem Hardwareluxx-Test auf den nachfolgenden Seiten.

Not only is the RTX series of cards incredibly difficult to obtain, but the retailers have realised this and some of the less reputable ones are gouging the customers to make the most of the scarcity. The UK always over-pays for things, but in this Covid/Post-Brexit world it has got ridiculous. However, the Gigabyte Eagle range of cards have an MSRP that is where it should be, so some careful hunting will allow you to grab one without going through the hoops of working out how many kidneys you need and which of your children would fetch the most. We've already reviewed the RTX 3060 Ti Eagle and it's surprisingly capable given it's price point, so we have high hopes for the regular Ampere edition card. Indeed the lack of availability is one of the reasons we've been holding off reviewing this until now. We wanted a card which had a standard MSRP so we could truly see what you can get for your money. One of the key elements down at this price point is the ability to run smoothly at 1080P. Regardless of the 'forum signature' setups that you might assume are the norm, in actuality most people still run at 1080 and so we're going to sort our graphs by 1080 for once to see how the RTX 3060 Eagle stacks up against the competition.

Going into this review I was excited to check out the RTX 3060 Eagle 12G because I haven’t had Gigabyte’s Eagle line in the office before. They launched it early last year and as you can imagine things have been tight from them on. Their Eagle lineup is Gigabyte’s budget-focused model but it does come in two different SKUs as far as the RTX 3060 is concerned. They have a referenced clocked 1777 MHz model which is what I am checking out today and then they have a similar model with an overclock which has a small overclock of 1807 MHz. While budget-focused Gigabyte didn’t do a bad job on the overall styling of the RTX 3060 Eagle. I am digging the grey color that they went with for the entire fan shroud and backplate. Black, grey, and silver are used often in video cards but this is a lighter shade than the grey you normally see and it looks good. They do still include Eagle branding and the bright blue or aqua color that they use with the Eagle line is also unique and good looking. They did also slip in a little bit of RGB lighting though I think the card could use a little more if you are going for it. But I was happy that they avoided using it to just light up branding which is what so many cards have.