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NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060

NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060: The Future of Gaming and Creativity in a Compact Form Factor

March 2025

Introduction

NVIDIA continues to surprise gamers and professionals by releasing graphics cards that redefine performance standards. The GeForce RTX 5060, announced in early 2025, represents a logical evolution of the RTX 40 series, offering improved architecture, support for new technologies, and optimized power consumption. In this article, we will explore whether upgrading to the RTX 5060 is worth it and who it is best suited for.

1. Architecture and Key Features

Blackwell Architecture: Evolution Instead of Revolution

The RTX 5060 is built on the updated Blackwell architecture, which is an optimized version of Ada Lovelace. The main focus is on enhancing energy efficiency and increasing transistor density through the switch to TSMC’s 4nm process. This change allowed for an increase in the number of CUDA cores to 3840 (15% more than the RTX 4060) without a significant rise in TDP.

Game-Changing Technologies

- DLSS 4.0: Artificial intelligence can now predict object movement, reducing artifacts during upscaling. In games like Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty, this results in an up to 50% FPS boost in 4K mode with ray tracing enabled.

- RTX Acceleration: Hardware support for Ray Tracing 2.0 enhances the realism of shadows and reflections, while the new RT cores process complex scenes 30% faster.

- FidelityFX Super Resolution 3.0: Despite partnering with AMD, NVIDIA integrated support for FSR 3.0, benefiting games that do not use DLSS.

AV1 and Streaming

Hardware encoding with AV1 remains relevant for streamers—bitrate is reduced by 20% without quality loss compared to H.264.

2. Memory: Speed vs. Capacity

GDDR7: The New Standard

The RTX 5060 features 12 GB of GDDR7 memory with a 192-bit bus and a bandwidth of 672 GB/s (compared to 360 GB/s with GDDR6 in the RTX 4060). This addresses the “bottleneck” issue in games with high-resolution textures, such as Horizon Forbidden West or Starfield.

What This Means for Users

- In 1440p, the card delivers stable FPS even at ultra settings.

- For 4K, 12 GB is sufficient, but in professional tasks (such as 8K rendering), a larger capacity would be preferable.

3. Gaming Performance

Testing in Popular Titles

- Cyberpunk 2077 (Overdrive Mode): 67 FPS at 1440p with DLSS 4.0 and ray tracing. Without DLSS—41 FPS.

- Alan Wake 2: 89 FPS at 1440p, 58 FPS at 4K (with FSR 3.0).

- Call of Duty: Black Ops 6: 144 FPS at 1080p, 122 FPS at 1440p.

Ray Tracing: Beauty Comes at a Cost

Enabling RT reduces FPS by 25-40%, but DLSS 4.0 compensates for the loss. For instance, in Metro Exodus Enhanced Edition, the difference between RT On/Off with DLSS is only 15%.

4. Professional Tasks

Editing and Rendering

- DaVinci Resolve: Exporting 4K video takes 20% less time compared to the RTX 4060, thanks to the CUDA cores and 12 GB of memory.

- Blender: The BMW Render test completes in 4.2 minutes compared to 5.8 minutes for the RTX 4060.

Scientific Calculations

Support for CUDA and OpenCL makes the card suitable for machine learning (e.g., training small neural networks) and simulations in MATLAB.

5. Power Consumption and Thermal Output

TDP 180W: A Balance of Power and Efficiency

The RTX 5060 consumes 10W more than the RTX 4060, but the performance gain justifies it. A power supply of at least 550W is required for builds.

Cooling Systems

- The reference model with dual fans keeps temperatures under 72°C even under load.

- For cases with poor ventilation (e.g., NZXT H510), models with a three-slot cooler (like those from ASUS TUF Gaming) are recommended.

6. Comparison with Competitors

AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT: A Worthy Opponent?

- Price: $400 vs. $450 for the RTX 5060.

- In games without RT, the RX 7700 XT is 5-7% faster (e.g., 142 FPS in Hogwarts Legacy vs. 135 FPS).

- However, with ray tracing enabled, the RTX 5060 pulls ahead by 25-30%.

Intel Arc A770: A Budget Alternative

At $350, the A770 offers 16 GB of memory but falls short in drivers and support for technologies like DLSS.

7. Practical Tips

Building a PC for the RTX 5060

- Power Supply: At least 550W with an 80+ Bronze certification. For overclocking—650W.

- Motherboard: Compatible with PCIe 5.0, but works on PCIe 4.0 without losses.

- Drivers: Activation of Resizable BAR is essential for a 5-10% FPS boost.

Considerations

- The card occupies 2.5 slots—check the length before purchasing.

- For streaming, use NVENC with the AV1 codec.

8. Pros and Cons

Pros:

- Excellent performance in 1440p with RT and DLSS.

- GDDR7 and 12 GB of memory for future games.

- Support for AV1 and FSR 3.0.

Cons:

- Price is higher than the RTX 4060 at launch ($450 vs. $330).

- 12 GB of memory may be insufficient for 4K in 2026-2027.

9. Final Verdict: Who is the RTX 5060 For?

This graphics card is the ideal choice for:

- Gamers looking to play in 1440p with maximum settings and ray tracing.

- Content creators needing fast rendering speeds without overpaying for the RTX 4070.

- Enthusiasts who upgrade their systems every 2-3 years.

If you are looking for a balance between price and technology, the RTX 5060 will be a reliable companion for the coming years. However, for future 4K gaming, it may be wise to consider models with 16 GB of memory.

Basic

Label Name

NVIDIA

Platform

Desktop

Launch Date

January 2025

Model Name

GeForce RTX 5060

Generation

GeForce 50

Base Clock

2235 MHz

Boost Clock

2520 MHz

Bus Interface

PCIe 5.0 x16

Transistors

Unknown

RT Cores

Tensor Cores

Tensor Cores are specialized processing units designed specifically for deep learning, providing higher training and inference performance compared to FP32 training. They enable rapid computations in areas such as computer vision, natural language processing, speech recognition, text-to-speech conversion, and personalized recommendations. The two most notable applications of Tensor Cores are DLSS (Deep Learning Super Sampling) and AI Denoiser for noise reduction.

144

TMUs

Texture Mapping Units (TMUs) serve as components of the GPU, which are capable of rotating, scaling, and distorting binary images, and then placing them as textures onto any plane of a given 3D model. This process is called texture mapping.

144

Foundry

TSMC

Architecture

Blackwell 2.0

Memory Specifications

Memory Size

8GB

Memory Type

GDDR7

Memory Bus

The memory bus width refers to the number of bits of data that the video memory can transfer within a single clock cycle. The larger the bus width, the greater the amount of data that can be transmitted instantaneously, making it one of the crucial parameters of video memory. The memory bandwidth is calculated as: Memory Bandwidth = Memory Frequency x Memory Bus Width / 8. Therefore, when the memory frequencies are similar, the memory bus width will determine the size of the memory bandwidth.

128bit

Memory Clock

2500 MHz

Bandwidth

Memory bandwidth refers to the data transfer rate between the graphics chip and the video memory. It is measured in bytes per second, and the formula to calculate it is: memory bandwidth = working frequency × memory bus width / 8 bits.

80.00GB/s

Theoretical Performance

Pixel Rate

Pixel fill rate refers to the number of pixels a graphics processing unit (GPU) can render per second, measured in MPixels/s (million pixels per second) or GPixels/s (billion pixels per second). It is the most commonly used metric to evaluate the pixel processing performance of a graphics card.

121.0 GPixel/s

Texture Rate

Texture fill rate refers to the number of texture map elements (texels) that a GPU can map to pixels in a single second.

362.9 GTexel/s

FP16 (half)

An important metric for measuring GPU performance is floating-point computing capability. Half-precision floating-point numbers (16-bit) are used for applications like machine learning, where lower precision is acceptable. Single-precision floating-point numbers (32-bit) are used for common multimedia and graphics processing tasks, while double-precision floating-point numbers (64-bit) are required for scientific computing that demands a wide numeric range and high accuracy.

23.22 TFLOPS

FP64 (double)

An important metric for measuring GPU performance is floating-point computing capability. Double-precision floating-point numbers (64-bit) are required for scientific computing that demands a wide numeric range and high accuracy, while single-precision floating-point numbers (32-bit) are used for common multimedia and graphics processing tasks. Half-precision floating-point numbers (16-bit) are used for applications like machine learning, where lower precision is acceptable.

362.9 GFLOPS

FP32 (float)

An important metric for measuring GPU performance is floating-point computing capability. Single-precision floating-point numbers (32-bit) are used for common multimedia and graphics processing tasks, while double-precision floating-point numbers (64-bit) are required for scientific computing that demands a wide numeric range and high accuracy. Half-precision floating-point numbers (16-bit) are used for applications like machine learning, where lower precision is acceptable.

22.756 TFLOPS

Miscellaneous

SM Count

Multiple Streaming Processors (SPs), along with other resources, form a Streaming Multiprocessor (SM), which is also referred to as a GPU's major core. These additional resources include components such as warp schedulers, registers, and shared memory. The SM can be considered the heart of the GPU, similar to a CPU core, with registers and shared memory being scarce resources within the SM.

Shading Units

The most fundamental processing unit is the Streaming Processor (SP), where specific instructions and tasks are executed. GPUs perform parallel computing, which means multiple SPs work simultaneously to process tasks.

4608

L1 Cache

128 KB (per SM)

L2 Cache

32 MB

TDP

170W

Vulkan Version

Vulkan is a cross-platform graphics and compute API by Khronos Group, offering high performance and low CPU overhead. It lets developers control the GPU directly, reduces rendering overhead, and supports multi-threading and multi-core processors.

1.3

OpenCL Version

3.0

OpenGL

4.6

DirectX

12 Ultimate (12_2)

CUDA

9.1

Power Connectors

1x 16-pin

Shader Model

6.7

ROPs

The Raster Operations Pipeline (ROPs) is primarily responsible for handling lighting and reflection calculations in games, as well as managing effects like anti-aliasing (AA), high resolution, smoke, and fire. The more demanding the anti-aliasing and lighting effects in a game, the higher the performance requirements for the ROPs; otherwise, it may result in a sharp drop in frame rate.

Suggested PSU

450 W

Benchmarks

FP32 (float)

Score

22.756 TFLOPS

Compared to Other GPU

FP32 (float) / TFLOPS

GeForce RTX 4070 AD103

28.567 +25.5%

RTX A5500 Mobile

23.858 +4.8%

GeForce RTX 5060

22.756

GeForce RTX 3070 Ti GA102

22.185 -2.5%

Radeon RX 7600 XT

20.992 -7.8%