NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 and 2070 Super review: Turing gets faster still

Note: This article was first published on 2 July 2019.

Supercharged Turing

NVIDIA isn't about to let AMD dominate the news cycle. Ever since Computex and E3 came and went with no word about that something "Super" that was coming, I had felt the anticipation for a new announcement from the green camp kind of wane. Then, out of nowhere, NVIDIA announced the GeForce RTX 2060, 2070, and 2080 Super, souped-up versions of the original Turing cards that pack in more CUDA cores and higher clock speeds. 

It almost seems like NVIDIA was waiting till just before the 7 July availability of the AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT and 5700 to announce the cards, seemingly hoping to undercut its rival and steal some of the thunder. After all, one of the selling points of the Radeon RX 5700 XT was that it offered slightly better performance than the GeForce RTX 2070 at the same price. 

NVIDIA intends to phase out the GeForce RTX 2070 and 2080 in favor of the Super models, so it looks like the Radeon RX 5700 XT will have to pit itself against a much stronger contender now. In the meantime, the GeForce RTX 2060 will stay as a more affordable alternative to the US$399 GeForce RTX 2060 Super. 

That said, here's a recap of what NVIDIA's GeForce RTX product stack looks like right now:

• NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 Ti (US$999)
• NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 Super (US$699)
• NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070 Super (US$499)
• NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 Super (US$399)
• NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 (US$349)

With that out of the way, I'll only be reviewing the GeForce RTX 2060 and 2070 Super today. These two cards will be available to buy on 9 July, but the GeForce RTX 2080 Super will arrive later on 23 July. 

What's new with Super?

To be honest, Super isn't the most exciting upgrade on paper. If you already bought a Turing card from last year, I'm not sure that there's a lot that will entice you to get one of these new cards. There's also no PCIe 4.0 support, which means AMD still has the lead in that area. 

That said, the performance boost is not insignificant, and the good news is that NVIDIA hasn't just ramped up the clock speeds to achieve this. It's added more CUDA cores as well, so this is a more far-reaching upgrade than it seems at first, even if it still uses the same Turing architecture. 

Here's an overview of the specifications of the cards:

The GeForce RTX 2060 Super may be the one that sees the most changes compared to its predecessor. Other than the increased CUDA core counts, it also boasts an expanded 8GB of GDDR6 memory and a wider memory bus. That may be why NVIDIA is offering it as a new SKU instead of using it to replace the GeForce RTX 2060, as it's doing with the GeForce RTX 2070 and 2080. 

Another thing that's changing is the way NVIDIA is treating its Founders Edition models. The first generation of Turing cards featured Founders Edition boards that shipped with higher base and boost clocks than the supposed reference specifications. That meant a US$100 premium on the Founders Edition variants, and some unsurprising tension between NVIDIA and its partners who wanted to sell overclocked versions of those cards as well. The overclocked Founders Edition models could be seen as cannibalizing partner sales, even if they didn't have the widest availability.

NVIDIA is changing tack this time around with Founders Edition models that stick to the stock speeds. This means that the hundred-dollar price premium is going away as well, good news for those of you who really like how they look. I'm not sure how I feel about this move though, since I find that the new Founders Edition models that NVIDIA introduced last year feature a luxurious build and look that go well with more aggressive clock speeds. They look and feel like high-end cards, and there's no reason why they shouldn't get a performance boost as well.

That aside, this year's Founders Edition models are getting a slightly new look too. Gone is the matte black centerpiece. In its place, NVIDIA has slapped on a shiny piece of chrome with a glorious mirror-like finish, topped off with the word "Super" in bright green. I really like the chrome, even if it is a fingerprint magnet, but I do think the green "Super" branding would look better if it was the same color as the rest of the model name.

The GeForce RTX 2070 Super Founders Edition is getting a few additional tweaks as well. It now requires one 8-pin and one 6-pin power connector, compared to just a single 8-pin connector from before. That's to be expected, since the TDP has also gone up from 185W to 215W. The card is longer this time as well, whereas before it was around the same size as the GeForce RTX 2060.

The green "Super" branding can be found on the backplate as well. Both cards still use the same machine-finished aluminum shroud as their predecessors, which means the same impeccable build quality and rock solid feel. Many high-end partner cards still feature plenty of plastic and garish RGB lights, so the Founders Edition cards seem to me like viable options for someone who wants a quality card that stands apart from the sea of strobing RGB lights out there. The only problem is that it's really hard to get your hands on one, and it'd be nice to see NVIDIA improve things in that area. 

However, appearances aside, nothing much has changed with this year's Founders Edition cards. On the cooling front, they still use two 13-blade axial fans and a vapor chamber cooling solution. They're actually surprisingly quiet for both cards, although temperatures still don't quite measure up to what you'll generally find on custom models. 

Finally, you'll find the same HDMI 2.0b, three DisplayPort 1.4a outputs, and a USB-C port that supports VirtualLink on the rear. 

I've already covered the new features baked into Turing, such as real-time ray tracing acceleration and more efficient shading, in greater detail here and here, so you can head there to find out more. 

Test setup

The detailed specifications of our new graphics card testbed system is as follows:-

• Intel Core i7-8086K (4.0GHz, 12MB L3 cache)
• ASUS ROG Strix Maximus X Hero (Intel Z370)
• 4 x 8GB G.Skill Ripjaws V DDR4-3000 (Auto timings: CAS 15-15-15-35)
• Samsung 860 EVO 500GB SSD
• Windows 10 Pro 64-bit
• ASUS PB287Q, 4K monitor

The full line-up of graphics cards tested are listed below:

• NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 Ti Founders Edition
• NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 Founders Edition
• NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070 Super Founders Edition
• NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070 Founders Edition
• NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 Super Founders Edition
• NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 Founders Edition

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Next up, here's a list of all the benchmarks used:

• 3DMark
• Ashes of the Singularity: Escalation
• Deus Ex: Mankind Divided
• Far Cry 5
• Metro Exodus
• Middle-earth: Shadow of War
• Shadow of the Tomb Raider
• Tom Clancy's The Division 2

3DMark

The synthetic 3DMark benchmark tests graphics and computational performance at different resolutions, starting at 1080p and going all the way up to 4K. A series of two graphics test, one physics test, and then a combined test stresses your hardware in turn to assess its performance.

The GeForce RTX 2070 Super and 2060 Super are 6 and 10 percent faster than their respective predecessors in 3DMark Fire Strike. That's not a super big difference, but the good news is the Super cards exhibit a bigger improvement in our in-game benchmarks. NVIDIA also isn't releasing a Super variant of the GeForce RTX 2080 Ti, and it's clear that that card is still the king of the hill. 

Ashes of the Singularity: Escalation

Ashes of the Singularity has long been the poster child for the performance benefits a low-level API like DirectX 12 can bring. It is based on the Nitrous engine and can be extremely punishing thanks to the huge number of onscreen units and the sheer level of detail accorded to each unit. However, the CPU does become the limiting factor at lower resolutions and settings. 

In the more demanding GPU-limiting scenarios, such as a 4K resolution and High settings, the GeForce RTX 2060 Super was a good 22 percent quicker than the regular model. That's a pretty impressive leap, and it goes from merely playable to a pretty comfortable frame rate. It's also a hair behind the GeForce RTX 2070, which kind of explains why NVIDIA is choosing to phase out that model.

Elsewhere, the GeForce RTX 2070 Super is around 9 percent faster than the 2070 at the aforementioned settings, a much smaller jump. However, it also comes close to the performance of the GeForce RTX 2080. 

Deus Ex: Mankind Divided

Mankind Divided features just about every trick to make your game look pretty, including things like volumetric and dynamic lighting, screenspace reflections, and cloth physics. Even though it was released in 2016, the game is capable of bringing even the most powerful systems to their knees. 

At 1440p and Ultra settings, the GeForce RTX 2070 Super is 12 percent faster than its predecessor. Meanwhile, the GeForce RTX 2060 Super is roughly 16 percent ahead of the 2060 at those same settings. Once again, those cards brush up against the GeForce RTX 2070 and 2080, so it's becoming increasingly clear why the Super models are coming in to replace them. 

Far Cry 5

The latest installment in the Far Cry series is actually an AMD launch title, so it'll be interesting to see how the green camp fares here. 

At 1080p and Ultra settings, the GeForce RTX 2060 Super was 22 percent faster than the GeForce RTX 2060. The GeForce RTX 2070 Super demonstrated a less stark improvement though, weighing in with just a 7 percent lead over the 2070. 

Metro Exodus

Metro Exodus runs better in DirectX 12, so that's the setting we chose to run our benchmarks at. There's just one caveat though – actual in-game performance is generally better than the results you get in the in-game benchmark, so this is best taken as an indicator of relative performance, rather than the absolute numbers you can expect in game.

This is also an NVIDIA game through and through, with options to turn on PhysX and HairWorks. However, these have been disabled to enable a more level playing field with AMD cards, as have options for ray tracing and DLSS. 

The GeForce RTX 2070 Super squeezed out a 13 percent lead over the 2070 at 1080p and Ultra settings, while the GeForce RTX 2060 Super muscled its way to an 18 percent advantage over the 2060.

Middle-earth: Shadow of War

Shadow of War isn't that demanding of a game to run by today's standards, and it looks like the GeForce RTX 2060 Super might even be capable of running the game at 4K and High settings. It raced ahead to a 21 percent lead with those presets, compared to the 2060, while the GeForce RTX 2070 Super settled for a more modest 16 percent advantage over the 2070. 

Shadow of the Tomb Raider

Like Metro Exodus, Shadow of the Tomb Raider runs better in DirectX 12 as well. DLSS and ray tracing have been added to the game already, but these numbers are obtained without those features turned on.

At 1440p and the Highest settings, the GeForce RTX 2070 Super had just under a 13 percent advantage over its predecessor, while the GeForce RTX 2060 Super powered ahead to a 27 percent lead. 

Tom Clancy's The Division 2

Division 2 is another new addition to our benchmark suite, and it replaces 2016's The Division. We've also shifted to DirectX 12 here as well because of the performance gains offered by the low-level API. 

The GeForce RTX 2070 Super is 17 percent faster than the 2070 at 1440p and Ultra settings, which makes the difference between being sort of able to run the game at 1440p and max settings and achieving a comfortable frame rate. Similarly, the GeForce RTX 2060 Super turned out an 18 percent improvement. 

Temperature and power consumption

The temperature measurements were obtained after running 40 loops of 3DMark Fire Strike Extreme's stress test and checking the peak sustained temperature. Similarly, the total system power consumption figures were read off a power meter during a run of Fire Strike Extreme.

There hasn't been much change in terms of thermal performance, and both the Super models exhibited just single degree increases in temperatures. Peak power consumption has increased by around 30 watts for both cards though, which isn't surprising given the increased core count and clock speeds. In fact, they're both now much closer to the GeForce RTX 2070 and 2080 respectively, shadowing them in both performance and power draw. 

Turing on steroids

Just like how Apple adds an "S" to the back of its iPhone models in the years that it's not doing a major overhaul, NVIDIA now helpfully appends a "Super" moniker to its graphics cards. This means not a lot has changed, but there are also minor cosmetic tweaks and under-the-hood changes that result in performance improvements that cannot be written off as insignificant. 

It's not clear whether NVIDIA will be sticking to this naming scheme moving forward, but for now at least, the GeForce RTX Super cards represent a pretty decent refresh of the RTX line-up. They aren't super exciting, with no major new designs or architectural features introduced. However, with AMD just about to release its Navi cards, this refresh helps keep the RTX cards relevant by giving them a performance boost at the same price point. 

However, there's also the glaring fact that they don't do much to address Turing's main weakness, which is the steep price. No one ever complained that Turing lacked on the performance front, but there were plenty of voices screeching that the cards were just priced out of this world, especially at the higher end. But while the GeForce RTX 2060 and 2070 Super may not be cheaper, they are anywhere from 10 to 20 per cent faster (and sometimes more), so you're technically getting more performance for your dollar. In fact, the GeForce RTX 2060 Super is pretty much the equivalent of the GeForce RTX 2070, while the 2070 Super takes the place of the 2080. That's quite an impressive improvement in value year-on-year, since the same amount this year, say US$499 for the GeForce RTX 2070 Super, will now net you the performance of a GeForce RTX 2080 from last year that cost US$699. 

No one ever complained that Turing lacked on the performance front, but there were plenty of voices screeching that the cards were just priced out of this world.

That said, I don't think anyone who already owns an equivalent first-generation Turing card will be looking to upgrade to these Super models. But if you were holding off on Turing because of the price, the added performance boost does help provide added justification for the asking price. I'd also argue that the GeForce RTX 2060 Super is more impressive than its 2070 counterpart, squeezing out larger gains over the regular 2060. 

The GeForce RTX 2060 Super and 2070 Super will be available to buy on 9 July, at which point you'll probably also be better equipped to make an informed decision after AMD's Navi cards drop on 7 July. 

	Performance	Features	Value	Overall
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070 Super Founders Edition	8.5	9.5	7.5
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 Super Founders Edition	8.0	9.5	7.5

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