MSI GTX 1060 6GB Gaming X Mining Performance and Review
|Recently, I’ve got my hands on some MSI GTX 1060 6GB Gaming X cards; as always I’ve spend some days trying to squeeze the most hashrate out of them. I am sharing my findings in this article.
Let’s start by quickly reviewing the basic specs of the GTX 1060 6GB:
Mining-related Specs
- CUDA Cores: 1280 Units
- Core Clocks: 1809 MHz / 1594 MHz (OC Mode), 1784 MHz / 1569 MHz (Gaming Mode)
- Memory Clock Speed: 8108 MHz (OC Mode)
- Memory: 6GB GDDR5
- Memory Bandwidth: 192 GB/sec
- Power consumption: 120 W
The GTX 1060 family features Pascal GP106-400 core, which makes it one of a kind – it is more advanced than the GM206 (installed in GTX 960 models) but it is one tier lower than the GP104 that comes in GTX 1070 and 1080 cards.
All of this means that the card isn’t exactly the top performer in gaming, which is one of the reasons why it is so cheap compared to higher tier cards. While there is always a crazy deal here and there, here’s a price pattern I’ve noticed:
GTX 1060: $ 400-500 USD |
+ 50% |
+ 100% | +150% |
GTX 1070: $ 700 USD | |||
GTX 1070 Ti: $ 800 USD | |||
GTX 1080: $ 900 USD | |||
GTX 1080 Ti: $ 1200+ USD |
Now, does the difference reflect the mining performance one? Well, not really. You can check my GTX 1070 and GTX 1080 reviews to know exactly what hashrates we are talking about and then compare those to the GTX 1060 mining performance test results I’m listing below.
All of this makes the GTX 1060 one of the best mining GPUs as for today. This might change tomorrow though, so make sure you do your own research first. For instance, GTX 1060 prices escalated from $250-300 USD per card to a whooping $500-600 USD in the past 4 months and nobody said this trend will stop now.
Recommended Hardware for 6x MSI GTX 1060 Mining Rig
- Motherboard: ASRock H81 PRO BTC, GIGABYTE GA-H110-D3A, Biostar TB250-BTC PRO
- CPU: Intel Celeron G1840 for ASRock H81 PRO BTC, Intel Celeron G3900 for Gigabyte H110-D3A & Biostar TB250-BTC PRO
- RAM: Kingston HyperX FURY 4GB 1333MHz DDR3 for ASRock H81 PRO BTC, Kingston Technology HyperX FURY 2400MHz DDR4 for Gigabyte H110-D3A & Biostar TB250-BTC PRO
- SSD: ADATA SU700 120GB
- PSU: 2x 650w EVGA SuperNOVA 650w G3, 80+ GOLD
- Dual PSU Adapter: Add2PSU Multiple Power Supply Adapter
- USB Risers: USB Riser VER 008 PCI-E 16x to 1x 60cm USB 3.0 Extension Cable
- Power Button: 2 Pin SW PC Power Cable on/off Push Button ATX Computer Switch Wire 45cm
- Energy Meter: TP-Link HS110 Smart Plug w/ Energy Monitoring
- Frame: https://1stminingrig.com/product/aluminum-mining-rig-open-air-frame/
Ethash Algorithm
- Ethereum (ETH)
- Ethereum Classic (ETC)
- Ubiq (UBQ)
- Expanse (EXP)
- Soilcoin (SOIL)
- Musicoin (MUSIC)
- etc..
Equihash Algorithm
- ZCash (ZEC)
- Zclassic (ZCL)
- Komodo (KMD)
- Hush (HUSH)
- Zencash (ZEN)
- etc..
CryptoNight Algorithm
- Monero (XMR)
- ByteCoin (BCN)
- Sumokoin (SUMO)
- Karbowanec (KRB)
- DigitalNote (XDN)
- etc..
MSI Gaming GTX 1060 6GB Mining Hashrate
System power draw is 50W
Ethereum Only
Ethash Ethereum Classic (ETC), Ubiq (UBQ), Expanse (EXP), Soilcoin (SOIL), Pirl (PIRL), Ellaism (ELLA), Metaverse (ETP) etc..
Hashrate 24 MH/s
- Clocks +100/+750
- Power Limit 65
- Power Draw 110w
Ethereum Dual Mining Decred and Pascal Lite
Ethereum 23 Mh/s – Decred 330 Mh/s
- Clocks +100/+750
- Power Limit 65
- Power Draw 130w
- -dcri 43
Ethereum 23 MH/s – Pascal Lite 300 Mh/s
- Clocks +100/+750
- Power Limit 65
- Power Draw 130w
- -dcri 30
Ethereum Dual Mining LBRY Credits and Pascalcoin
Ethereum 23 Mh/s – LBRY 24 Mh/s
- Clocks +100/+750
- Power Limit 65
- Power Draw 120w
- -dcri 35
Ethereum 23 MH/s – Pascal 292 Mh/s
- Clocks +100/+750
- Power Limit 65
- Power Draw 130w
- -dcri 38
ZCash (Equihash) Mining Performance
MSI GTX 1060 6GB Gaming X ZCash Mining Hashrate Performance & Power Consumption
Equihash algorithm: Bitcoin Gold (BTG), Zencash (ZEN), Zclassic (ZCL), Hush (HUSH), Komodo (KMD)
EWBF’s CUDA Zcash Miner
Download and extract EWBF’s CUDA Zcash miner: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1707546.0
Hashrate 340 Sol/s
- Clocks +150/+500
- Power Limit 65
- Power Draw 130w
Bitcoin Gold Mining Performance
MSI GTX 1060 6GB Gaming X Bitcoin Gold Mining Hashrate Performance & Power Consumption
Equihash algorithm: Zencash (ZEN), Zclassic (ZCL), Hush (HUSH), Komodo (KMD)
Download and extract EWBF Cuda Miner 0.3.4b BTG: https://github.com/poolgold/ewbf-miner-btg-edition/releases
Hashrate 335 Sol/s
- Clocks +150/+500
- Power Limit 65
- Power Draw 125w
Nicehash Mining Performance
MSI GTX 1060 6GB Gaming X Nicehash Mining Hashrate Performance & Bitcoin Profitability
In Conclusion
I’ve tried this card and I can say for sure that it performs well for its price. Say, if I compare it to a GTX 1070Ti I get 10% lower hashrate with the same hashrate/power consumption ratio at half the price (A new MSI GTX 1070Ti costs about $ 1.500 USD on Newegg). As for today, the MSI GTX 1060 is probably the only GTX 10xx GPU that has a 1 year ROI when mining Ethereum and some other well-known coins.