According to a new regulatory filing, Nvidia and Gigabyte are planning to rerelease the RTX 2060 graphics card with a significant VRAM upgrade.
Four new Gigabyte graphics card SKUs are mentioned in the document, which was submitted to the Eurasian Economic Commission and published on November 15. All four are for new versions of the Nvidia RTX 2060, and they all show a 12GB variant, up from the original 6GB when the card was released in 2019.
According to the SKUs, the cards will be available in both GB Gaming and GB WindForce branding, with a standard and overclocked model for each.
Beyond the increased VRAM, it’s unclear whether the new cards will include any other improvements over the 2019 cards. According to Wccftech, the move comes as AMD’s upcoming budget Big Navi cards based on the Navi 24 GPU are expected to outperform the RTX 3050 and RTX 3050 Ti GPUs.
It’s also possible that the move is an attempt by Nvidia to do something, anything, to address stock shortages of its latest Nvidia Ampere cards, such as the RTX 3060, RTX 3070, and RTX 3080.
With every gamer who upgrades from older GPUs like the GTX 1660 Ti to RTX 2060 cards, fewer people will be clamoring for the hard-to-find Ampere cards, making it easier for others to purchase them.
In the short term, how much of a difference will the rerelease of a three-year-old graphics card make? Nobody knows for sure, but the card is expected to be released in early December, so we’ll find out soon enough.
Analysis
Is it worth the effort? No, but it could help Nvidia earn a little more cash.
Are we going to get our hands on the RTX 30-series graphics cards that we really want, if RTX 2060 is upgraded? It’s highly unlikely.
Anyone who is still undecided about purchasing an RTX 2060 is unlikely to be swayed by the additional VRAM at this point. As more RTX 2060 cards enter the market, the demand for more powerful Ampere cards is not likely to change.
How about taking on AMD’s upcoming Navi 24 graphics cards in direct competition? While the GTX 1660 Ti is no longer the best value for money option, it’s still more than capable of handling Navi 24. While the GTX 1660 Ti lacks ray tracing cores, Navi 24 has ray tracing capabilities, but they won’t be very useful.
As for the RTX 2060, it can indeed render ray-traced graphics, but at a frame rate that most gamers are unwilling to compromise. The added features on these budget cards are a moot point, as most people prefer 60 fps non-ray-traced visuals over 30 fps with ray tracing any day of the week.
On the other hand, Nvidia is likely to profit from this move because any graphics card on the market, even a three-year-old one, is likely to be sold. That’s most likely why this decision was made.
