Nvidia RTX 4060 review roundup: you deserve better

Linus Tech Tips is calling it a “wet fart of a GPU.” Hardware Unboxed says it’s “a slap in the face to gamers.” Here’s how GamersNexus begins its conclusion: “This isn’t as egregiously embarrassing as the 4060 Ti.”

They’re all talking about the Nvidia RTX 4060, a 1080p-focused graphics card which launches tomorrow for $300 — and probably isn’t worth that price.

Not everyone thinks it’s a bad card. I’ve poured through reviews today, and some conclude that it is, at least, one of the best 1080p cards you can currently buy brand-new. Here’s Andrew Cunningham with Ars Technica:

It’s not an exciting upgrade, but if you asked me which GPU I would buy for an $800 to $1,000 gaming PC, the RTX 4060 would be the one I’d point to, especially with so many 3060 cards (as of this writing) still selling for pretty close to the same $300 price.

And Jarred Walton with Tom’s Hardware:

The RTX 4060 isn’t a terrible card by any means. Some people will probably say it is, but across our benchmark suite, it was universally faster than the previous generation RTX 3060 at every setting that mattered (meaning, not counting 4K ultra performance, where neither card delivered acceptable performance). There will be edge cases where it falls behind, like Spider-Man: Miles Morales running 1440p ultra, where minimum fps was clearly worse than on the 3060. But overall? Yes, it’s faster than the previous generation, and it even cuts the price by $30 — not that the RTX 3060 was available for $329 during most of its shelf life.

Every reviewer notes that Nvidia did do a good job on power consumption, with a card that consumes under 115W under load. Some point out that DLSS 3 frame generation made a notable difference — in the handful of games that support it.

But every reviewer I’ve seen also agrees this GPU is hamstrung by a paltry 128-bit memory bus and 8GB of VRAM. Many point out that the 4060 is not only occasionally losing to the 3060 — a two-year-old GPU which already struggled to justify its existence — it’s almost always losing to the two-and-a-half-year-old 3060 Ti.

Here’s Chris Szewczyk with PC Gamer:

The RTX 3060 Ti retains a notable lead over the RTX 4060 here. When viewed in that context, the RTX 4060 is on the disappointing side. We’d usually expect a card from a new generation to match a card a tier up from the previous generation, in this case, that would be the RTX 3070, but since even the 3060 Ti is out of reach, the 3070 remains completely unchallenged.

And Steven Walton at TechSpot:

The RTX 4060 aligns more with what we traditionally think of as a GTX 1650 or GTX 1050 Ti-class product – a $100-$150 GPU, not a $300 one. One glance at the MSI Ventus 2x MSRP model we were sent is enough to conclude that this isn’t typically what we consider a $300 graphics card.

You can currently find the 3060 Ti for as low as $330 — no, even as low as $275 on sale. Or, you could pick up the AMD Radeon RX 6700 XT, one model of which is currently $310 at Newegg. Or the Radeon RX 7600, a card that somewhat disappointed my colleague Tom but at least costs $30-$40 less than Nvidia’s new model and can sometimes beat it in rasterized games.

Personally, I’d sooner roll the dice on a used 3070 than any of these. I’m not a fan of the direction GPUs have been headed, and eBay completed listings show a preowned 3070, which will soundly beat the 4060, can be had for roughly the same price.