GeForce RTX 3060 Max-Q vs GTX 960

Primary details

GPU architecture, market segment, value for money and other general parameters compared.

Place in the ranking	342	not rated
Place by popularity	55	not in top-100
Cost-effectiveness evaluation	9.09	no data
Power efficiency	9.02	no data
Architecture	Maxwell 2.0 (2014−2019)	Ampere (2020−2024)
GPU code name	GM206	GA106
Market segment	Desktop	Laptop
Release date	22 January 2015 (9 years ago)	12 January 2021 (3 years ago)
Launch price (MSRP)	$199	no data

Cost-effectiveness evaluation

Performance to price ratio. The higher, the better.

Detailed specifications

General parameters such as number of shaders, GPU core base clock and boost clock speeds, manufacturing process, texturing and calculation speed. Note that power consumption of some graphics cards can well exceed their nominal TDP, especially when overclocked.

Pipelines / CUDA cores	1024	3840
Core clock speed	1127 MHz	817 MHz
Boost clock speed	1178 MHz	1282 MHz
Number of transistors	2,940 million	13,250 million
Manufacturing process technology	28 nm	8 nm
Power consumption (TDP)	120 Watt	60 Watt
Texture fill rate	75.39	153.8
Floating-point processing power	2.413 TFLOPS	9.846 TFLOPS
ROPs	32	48
TMUs	64	120
Tensor Cores	no data	120
Ray Tracing Cores	no data	30

Form factor & compatibility

Information on compatibility with other computer components. Useful when choosing a future computer configuration or upgrading an existing one. For desktop graphics cards it's interface and bus (motherboard compatibility), additional power connectors (power supply compatibility).

Laptop size	no data	large
Bus support	PCI Express 3.0	no data
Interface	PCIe 3.0 x16	PCIe 4.0 x16
Length	241 mm	no data
Height	4.376" (11.1 cm)	no data
Width	2-slot	no data
Recommended system power (PSU)	400 Watt	no data
Supplementary power connectors	1x 6-pin	None
SLI options	+	-

VRAM capacity and type

Parameters of VRAM installed: its type, size, bus, clock and resulting bandwidth. Integrated GPUs have no dedicated video RAM and use a shared part of system RAM.

Memory type	GDDR5	GDDR6
Maximum RAM amount	4 GB	6 GB
Memory bus width	128 Bit	192 Bit
Memory clock speed	7.0 GB/s	1500 MHz
Memory bandwidth	112 GB/s	288.0 GB/s
Shared memory	-	-

Connectivity and outputs

Types and number of video connectors present on the reviewed GPUs. As a rule, data in this section is precise only for desktop reference ones (so-called Founders Edition for NVIDIA chips). OEM manufacturers may change the number and type of output ports, while for notebook cards availability of certain video outputs ports depends on the laptop model rather than on the card itself.

Display Connectors	Dual Link DVI-I, HDMI 2.0, 3x DisplayPort 1.2	No outputs
Multi monitor support	4 displays	no data
HDMI	+	-
HDCP	+	-
Maximum VGA resolution	2048x1536	no data
G-SYNC support	+	-
Audio input for HDMI	Internal	no data

Supported technologies

Supported technological solutions. This information will prove useful if you need some particular technology for your purposes.

GameStream	+	-
GeForce ShadowPlay	+	-
GPU Boost	2.0	no data
GameWorks	+	-

API compatibility

List of supported 3D and general-purpose computing APIs, including their specific versions.

DirectX	12 (12_1)	12 Ultimate (12_2)
Shader Model	6.4	6.5
OpenGL	4.4	4.6
OpenCL	1.2	2.0
Vulkan	+	1.2
CUDA	+	8.6

Pros & cons summary

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Recency	22 January 2015	12 January 2021
Maximum RAM amount	4 GB	6 GB
Chip lithography	28 nm	8 nm
Power consumption (TDP)	120 Watt	60 Watt

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