Nvidia's latest Game Ready Driver changelog confirms the RTX 2060 12GB

[Polycount]

Confirmed: Though we're already well into the life cycle of RTX 30-series cards, rumors have been floating around that suggest Nvidia is working on a new, 12GB 2060 model. With next-gen titles increasing texture sizes substantially, an affordable, RT-ready card with twice the VRAM of its predecessor is a pretty appealing notion to many. However, the card hadn't been confirmed officially by Nvidia... until now.

In today's Game Ready Driver release notes, for driver version 497.09 WHQL, Nvidia distinctly mentions adding support for what it calls the "GeForce RTX 2060 12GB." Upon first glance, it might seem odd that the company didn't attach the "Super" moniker to this card. After all, all signs point to the specs lining up closely with the 8GB 2060 Super rather than the older 6GB 2060.

It will likely have the same number of CUDA, RT, and Tensor cores, and the boost clock is also predicted to be identical. However, there are still differences, according to Videocardz. Specifically, the 2060 12GB will ship with a 192-bit memory bus and 336 GB/s memory bandwidth, which is what the base 2060 had. For contrast, the 2060 Super has a 256-bit bus and 448 GB/s of memory bandwidth.

A few things are still unclear at the moment, though. We aren't sure precisely when the card will release -- rumors point toward December 7 -- nor do we know how much it will cost. We wouldn't expect an MSRP too different from the 2060 Super, which sat right at the $400 mark.

Either way, we probably won't be waiting long for answers to these unknowns. Presumably, Nvidia wouldn't list it as a newly-supported device if a release date isn't on the horizon. Of course, that assumes the company didn't mistakenly mention the 2060 in its latest GRD changelog, which is possible.

Ordinarily, the re-release of what is effectively a last-gen card with some extra VRAM might not be cause for so much buzz. However, the PC hardware market is in terrible shape right now, with crypto miners and bot-equipped scalpers buying up every GPU they can get their hands on in bulk. As such, almost every new card launch is worth paying attention to for ordinary gamers.

Permalink to story.

https://www.techspot.com/news/92459-nvidia-latest-game-ready-driver-patch-notes-confirm.html

 

[brucek]

1) makes sense
2) super depressing
3) $400 for last-gen 60-level card, MSRP, which you won't even be able to pay = shoot me

I remember when bloggers were advising people to hurry up and dump their 2080ti for like $300... glad I wasn't in a position to take that advice.

 

[Dimitriid]

I'm surprised they bothered to include it on the driver but I guess they want to have it covered in the extremely unlikely and remote case an actual gamer ends up owning one of these if a retailer sells it to a gamer instead of a miner (Purely by mistake of course) but that scenario would probably be entirely by mistake.

 

[Shadowboxer]

I’m no crypto mining expert but wouldn’t that extra 6GB of RAM make a massive difference to miners? For gamers it won’t mean much, the 6GB version smashes most games at 1080p with ease, its actually a decent gaming card. I’m guessing they aren’t LHR either. Shame but you can’t blame these companies for selling to the customers who pay them the most.

 

[veLa]

There are two ways to interpret this.

1. It's terrible because we aren't getting any sort of tangible advancement. It's literally a previous gen card with extra VRAM strapped to it. Will it even be available at its MSRP?

2. Because the crippling chip shortage is driving both the IT industry and tech hobbyists insane, if this product is reasonably affordable and available, it fills a literal gap in the market for video cards that have acceptable graphics performance. So it could be a good thing in the meantime if it means people can finally get their systems built.

I want to go with option two. Here's to hoping the old manufacturing process has enough available supply to actually keep the RTX 2060 12GB on store shelves.

 

[Neatfeatguy]

There are two ways to interpret this.

1. It's terrible because we aren't getting any sort of tangible advancement. It's literally a previous gen card with extra VRAM strapped to it. Will it even be available at its MSRP?

2. Because the crippling chip shortage is driving both the IT industry and tech hobbyists insane, if this product is reasonably affordable and available, it fills a literal gap in the market for video cards that have acceptable graphics performance. So it could be a good thing in the meantime if it means people can finally get their systems built.

I want to go with option two. Here's to hoping the old manufacturing process has enough available supply to actually keep the RTX 2060 12GB on store shelves.

Nvidia is drooling as they're blowing the dust off the left over TU106 chips they've had in storage for the past 2 years. Laughing as they're pricing them out at the same price a 3060 goes for, but will only provide around 80% the gaming performance of a 3060.

A 2060 looks, according to what I find when searching, just a little better hashrate over what a 3060 offers. Could just be another good card for miners....but then again, your mileage may vary.

For Nvidia, it's just money in the bank!

 

[Achaios]

1) makes sense
2) super depressing
3) $400 for last-gen 60-level card, MSRP, which you won't even be able to pay = shoot me

I remember when bloggers were advising people to hurry up and dump their 2080ti for like $300... glad I wasn't in a position to take that advice.

$400 MSRP? Naw.

Tom's Hardware says you'd be lucky to find this sold below $700 or abt 750 EUR in the EU b/c we're expensive like that.

 

[Nobina]

RTX 2060 Mining Edition. I don't care as long as they are widely availible(lol) at a somewhat reasonable price(lol) so that gamers can get their hands on them.

 

[Neatfeatguy]

I don't understand why they're calling it a relaunch of the 2060. It should be more like a slightly gimped version of the 2060S.

Specs show they have all the exact same cores as the 2060 Super, the only difference is they're sticking with the 192 bus that the original 2060 uses and bumping the VRAM up from 6GB to 12GB.

Will the 192 bus hinder the performance and make the 12GB worthless?

The 2060S was about as fast as the 2070...will this version be as fast??? Faster??? Slower???