Wrapping Things Up: Taking Averages

The RX 570 pushed total system consumption to almost 300 watts which is still manageable despite the fact that the same system with the 1060 consumed almost 20% less power.

The RX 570 ended up delivering just a single extra frame on average at 1080p and surprisingly just two extra frames at 1440p. That said, the graph above includes the results for Resident Evil 7, but that title was a massive outlier. Take a look:

If we include all the results this is what the overall picture looks like. As you can see it's pretty even across the board until you throw in the one game where the GTX 1060 3GB tanked. We didn't see any other situation where the RX 570 provided playable performance while the GTX 1060 3GB failed.

I'm keen to see just how much you have to downgrade the quality settings before the 1060 recovers but that will have to wait until after Computex.

For now, if we remove Resident Evil 7, the RX 570 actually ends up being 2% slower overall but to be fair the results are still quite even. The RX 570 was faster in 13 games and slower in 14 while the cards tied in a single title. As we often find, there's no clear winner here and it simply boils down to the games you plan to play.

Each card has its strengths and weaknesses. The GTX 1060 3GB's greatest weakness is its the limited memory buffer, but to be fair this is rarely an issue at 1080p. As a brief tangent, the 3GB model was released almost a year ago and back then we heard how it was dead on arrival, even for those gaming at 1080p. Well, with the exception of one game, we have 28 examples that show the 3GB 1060 providing quite playable performance at 1080p, particularly in relation to the RX 570. If you bought a 3GB model last year, you're probably wondering what all the fuss was about.

The GTX 1060 offers considerably better power consumption, more overclocking headroom and cooler operating temperatures, while the RX 570 offers strong performance across the board with a slightly larger VRAM buffer that can help keep it out of trouble and the ability to be paired with a FreeSync monitor.

Which one would I go with? It would truly come down to which one was cheapest and again, the games that I intended on playing. That said, I feel like the RX 570 is the safer bet, but I also really like the low power consumption of the GTX 1060 3GB which generally allows for cooler and quieter board partner cards. These attributes may also make the GTX 1060 a better pairing for budget builds with lower quality power supplies.

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Basing your decision on which one I would pick isn't a wise choice here. If you have a FreeSync capable monitor or see yourself getting one then the RX 570 is an obvious choice, while if your monitor doesn't support an adaptive sync technology and you tend to play games that favor the green team, then the GTX 1060 seems like a smarter choice. In the end, you'll have to pick the "winner" that best suits your own circumstances, though the heap of data included here should help you make the right decision.

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