EVGA GeForce GTX 960 SuperSC Graphics Card Review

For about as long as GPU-accelerated games have existed, an ideal performance target has been 60 frames-per-second. Owing thanks to this is the standard 60Hz monitor, which delivers its best result when the framerate matches its refresh rate. To make sure the monitor’s refresh rate and game’s framerate keep aligned, to avoid visible tearing, VSync should be enabled.

While I believe our Best Playable results will appeal to any gamer, they could especially prove useful to those intrigued by livingroom gaming or console replacements. The goal here is simple: With each game, the graphics settings are tweaked to deliver the best possible detail while keeping us as close to 60 FPS on average as possible.

Because our Metro Last Light and Total War: SHOGUN 2 tests are timedemos, and because this kind of testing is time-consuming, I am sticking to six out of the eight games I test with for inclusion here.

Both of the GTX 960 cards I’ve looked at are clocked similarly, so the settings used for EVGA’s SuperSC are identical to those that were used for the ASUS Strix.

	Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag
	Minimum		Average
EVGA GTX 960 SSC	51		59
Graphics Settings & Ingame Screenshot Resolution: 2560×1440	Environment:	High	Shadow:	High
	Texture:	High	Reflection:	High
	Anti-aliasing:	FXAA	God Rays:	High
	Ambient Occlusion:	Off	Volumetric Fog:	On
	Motion Blur	On
ASUS GTX 960 Strix	46		57
Graphics Settings & Ingame Screenshot Resolution: 2560×1440	Environment:	High	Shadow:	High
	Texture:	High	Reflection:	High
	Anti-aliasing:	FXAA	God Rays:	High
	Ambient Occlusion:	Off	Volumetric Fog:	On
	Motion Blur	On

While the ultimate goal is to hit 60 FPS in any of these best playable tests, we didn’t hit it perfectly on either of these cards. That’s because at the performance exhibited, it made little sense for me to decrease settings further. Should you really want to hit a clean 60 FPS and at least 50 FPS on the minimum, God Rays can be decreased in detail. For 1080p gaming, the detail levels can match those in our regular testing (seen on page 2).

	Battlefield 4
	Minimum		Average
EVGA GTX 960 SSC	55		71
Graphics Settings & Ingame Screenshot Resolution: 2560×1440	Texture Quality:	Ultra	Texture Filtering:	Ultra
	Lighting:	Ultra	Effects:	High
	Post Processing:	Ultra	Mesh:	Ultra
	Terrain:	Ultra	Terrain Decoration:	Ultra
	Anti-aliasing Deferred:	Off	Anti-aliasing Post:	Off
	Ambient Occlusion:	SSAO
ASUS GTX 960 Strix	53		68
Graphics Settings & Ingame Screenshot Resolution: 2560×1440	Texture Quality:	Ultra	Texture Filtering:	Ultra
	Lighting:	Ultra	Effects:	High
	Post Processing:	Ultra	Mesh:	Ultra
	Terrain:	Ultra	Terrain Decoration:	Ultra
	Anti-aliasing Deferred:	Off	Anti-aliasing Post:	Off
	Ambient Occlusion:	SSAO

The GTX 960 is able to handle this game at Ultra detail with antialiasing off, quite handily. For 1080p, you can use the Ultra setting to achieve ~59 FPS, as seen in our regular testing.

	Crysis 3
	Minimum		Average
EVGA GTX 960 SSC	50		68
Graphics Settings & Ingame Screenshot Resolution: 1920×1080	Anti-aliasing:	FXAA	Texture:	Very High
	Effects:	High	Object:	High
	Particles:	High	Post Processing:	High
	Shading:	High	Shadows:	High
	Water:	High	Anisotropic Filtering:	x16
	Motion Blur:	Medium	Lens Flares:	Yes
ASUS GTX 960 Strix	44		67
Graphics Settings & Ingame Screenshot Resolution: 1920×1080	Anti-aliasing:	FXAA	Texture:	Very High
	Effects:	High	Object:	High
	Particles:	High	Post Processing:	High
	Shading:	High	Shadows:	High
	Water:	High	Anisotropic Filtering:	x16
	Motion Blur:	Medium	Lens Flares:	Yes

Unfortunately, 1440p is a bit harsh on a card like the GTX 960 in Crysis 3, so 1080p it is, with texture detail bumped up to Very High. Interestingly, this change didn’t affect the average FPS at all versus keeping texture detail to High.

	GRID 2
	Minimum		Average
EVGA GTX 960 SSC	52		61
Graphics Settings & Ingame Screenshot Resolution: 2560×1440	Multisampling:	4x MSAA	Night Lighting:	High
	Shadows:	Ultra	Advanced Fog:	On
	Particles:	Ultra	Crowd:	Ultra
	Cloth:	High	Ambient Occlusion:	Ultra
	Soft Ambient Occlusion:	On	Ground Cover:	High
	Vehicle Details:	High	Trees:	Ultra
	Objects:	Ultra	Vehicle Reflections:	Ultra
	Water:	High	Post Process:	High
	Skidmarks:	On	Advanced Lighting:	On
	Global Illumination:	On	Anisotropic Filtering:	Ultra
ASUS GTX 960 Strix	51		59
Graphics Settings & Ingame Screenshot Resolution: 2560×1440	Multisampling:	4x MSAA	Night Lighting:	High
	Shadows:	Ultra	Advanced Fog:	On
	Particles:	Ultra	Crowd:	Ultra
	Cloth:	High	Ambient Occlusion:	Ultra
	Soft Ambient Occlusion:	On	Ground Cover:	High
	Vehicle Details:	High	Trees:	Ultra
	Objects:	Ultra	Vehicle Reflections:	Ultra
	Water:	High	Post Process:	High
	Skidmarks:	On	Advanced Lighting:	On
	Global Illumination:	On	Anisotropic Filtering:	Ultra

It’s not the most intensive game out there, but GRID 2 is still gorgeous – and, it’s able to be run at 60 FPS with a GTX 960 at 1440p resolution.

	Sleeping Dogs
	Minimum		Average
EVGA GTX 960 SSC	64		80
Graphics Settings & Ingame Screenshot Resolution: 2560×1440	Anti-aliasing:	Normal	High-res Textures:	On
	Shadow Resolution:	High	Shadow Filtering:	High
	Ambient Occlusion:	High	Motion Blur:	High
	World Density:	Extreme
ASUS GTX 960 Strix	65		80
Graphics Settings & Ingame Screenshot Resolution: 2560×1440	Anti-aliasing:	Normal	High-res Textures:	On
	Shadow Resolution:	High	Shadow Filtering:	High
	Ambient Occlusion:	High	Motion Blur:	High
	World Density:	Extreme

As beautiful as Sleeping Dogs is, it’s one setting in particular that obliterates performance: anti-aliasing. Once that’s dropped down to normal levels, the GTX 960 delivers excellent framerates at 1440p.

	Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell: Blacklist
	Minimum		Average
EVGA GTX 960 SSC	55		65
Graphics Settings & Ingame Screenshot Resolution: 2560×1440	Texture Detail:	Ultra	Shadow:	High
	Parallax:	On	Tessellation:	On
	Texture Filtering:	16x	Ambient Occlusion:	Off
	Anti-aliasing:	FXAA
ASUS GTX 960 Strix	54		66
Graphics Settings & Ingame Screenshot Resolution: 2560×1440	Texture Detail:	Ultra	Shadow:	High
	Parallax:	On	Tessellation:	On
	Texture Filtering:	16x	Ambient Occlusion:	Off
	Anti-aliasing:	FXAA

Wrapping up with Blacklist, the GTX 960 once again delivers great performance, with even the minimum FPS value keeping close to 60 FPS.