Zotac GeForce RTX 2060 Amp

[#DEXTER]

Higher performance, ray tracing, and AI capabilities have been at the forefront of our GeForce RTX 20-series graphics card reviews. However, our conclusions about the models released thus far (the GeForce RTX 2070, the RTX 2080, and the RTX 2080 Ti) have found that the value of their generational performance gains over the preceding GeForce GTX 10 series, although significant, have been offset by higher prices. In fairness, we've yet to see games take advantage of many of the new technologies in the GeForce RTX 20 series. But using today's games, we haven't seen the per-dollar performance increase we've seen from previous generations. At least, that was the case until now. The GeForce RTX 2060 is the first GeForce RTX 20-series card to offer a substantial per-dollar performance improvement over the prior generation, a distinction that helps this Zotac version of the card ($369.99) earn an Editors' Choice laurel for upper-mid-level graphics cards.

GeForce RTX 2060: The Essentials

The new GeForce RTX 2060 is here to make us rethink the economic angle of RTX. On paper, its technical specifications are relatively close to those of the $499-starting-price GeForce RTX 2070, but RTX 2060 cards are priced starting at "just" $349. That makes the GeForce RTX 2060 more expensive than its predecessor, the GeForce GTX 1060 ($299). However, it's close enough still to be considered mainstream turf. As our benchmark test results will show, the GeForce RTX 2060 delivers gaming performance well above what we've come to expect from a mid-level performer. No question, it's faster than the GeForce GTX 1060, and it even outperforms the GeForce GTX 1070 by double-digit percentages.

First, though, let's run through some quick background on the GeForce RTX 2060 and the GeForce RTX 20-series before getting into the finer details. Based on the new "Turing" architecture, Nvidia's latest generation of graphics processors (GPUs) brings improved gaming performance and new technologies over the outgoing "Pascal" architecture of the GeForce GTX 10 series. Two of the hallmark new technologies with Turing are hardware-accelerated ray tracing and AI-driven Deep Level Super Sampling (DLSS). Both have seen a slow adoption among game developers, although some lenience is due; it's been less than six months since the GeForce RTX 20-series launch, and that's not a long time in the game-development world.

That's about all I'm going to say about Turing nitty-gritty in this article. Our GeForce RTX 2080 Founders Edition review has a comprehensive look at Turing and is well worth a read if you need the background.

Under review is the GeForce RTX 2060 Amp edition from the well-established Nvidia board partner Zotac. This card shares nearly all of its technical specifications with the Nvidia GeForce RTX 2060 Founders Edition, but is priced at $369 ($20 higher) because of its factory overclock.

Here's how the GeForce RTX 2060 compares to the outgoing GeForce GTX 1060. (Note I used Nvidia's reference specifications for the GeForce RTX 2060 in the tables below; I'll explain the minor differences with the Zotac GeForce RTX 2060 Amp in the next section.)