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mZuzek said:

What's up, PC people? You might not know me as much of a hardcore PC gamer - it's because I'm not.

But you see, in recent months my GPU's cooler started malfunctioning. I've been able to get it to work with a makeshift solution (which totally does not involve me spinning the fan until it gets going), but it's very much something that needs replacing. However, my computer is over 6 years old by now and replacing it is something I've wanted to do for a while, so instead of just buying a new cooler, I decided it's finally time to start buying new things, starting with the GPU of course.

Now, I was looking through a few and very much decided it's gonna be the GTX 1060 (6GB). Looks like a good GPU that'll be able to handle mostly everything out now and still hold its own for a few more years, and it's borderline affordable. However, what I haven't decided on is the manufacturer - I've heard lots of good things about EVGA in general, particularly the warranty, but from what I've seen the Gigabyte one performs slightly better, and it's cheaper. The warranty point is moot in this case because both only give me 12 months of it. At the moment I'm leaning towards the Gigabyte one for the price and performance, but I'd like to hear some more opinions.

For reference, my top priorities are noise (or lack of it), and durability/reliability (not so much warranty as I'm definitely going beyond that period). I want something that works silently and doesn't give me headaches for a number of years.

If you really want the card to last a few years, I think you should go for a RX 580/590 card. But not because of performance, as they're very close, but because the extra 2GB of VRAM those cards have.

I honestly think that, in order to play the ports from the next gen consoles, we'll see how the system requirements ask for cards with at least 6 if not 8GB of video RAM.

As for noise, nowadays most cards come with aftermarket coolers that allow for better temps and noise so, as long as the airflow on your PC is good, almost any card will work well. That said, it's never a bad idea to look for reviews of the cards you're interested in.