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GeForce GTS 250 1GB vs Radeon HD 6790

Intro

The GeForce GTS 250 1GB has a core clock frequency of 738 MHz and a GDDR3 memory frequency of 1100 MHz. It also makes use of a 256-bit memory bus, and makes use of a 65/55 nm design. It is made up of 128 SPUs, 64 TAUs, and 16 ROPs.

Compare all that to the Radeon HD 6790, which uses a 40 nm design. AMD has set the core frequency at 840 MHz. The GDDR5 memory works at a frequency of 1050 MHz on this specific model. It features 800 SPUs as well as 40 TAUs and 16 Rasterization Operator Units.

(No game benchmarks for this combination yet.)

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTS 250 1GB 145 Watts
Radeon HD 6790 150 Watts
Difference: 5 Watts (3%)

Memory Bandwidth

The Radeon HD 6790 should in theory perform much faster than the GeForce GTS 250 1GB overall. (explain)

Radeon HD 6790 134400 MB/sec
GeForce GTS 250 1GB 70400 MB/sec
Difference: 64000 (91%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTS 250 1GB will be much (approximately 41%) more effective at AF than the Radeon HD 6790. (explain)

GeForce GTS 250 1GB 47232 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 6790 33600 Mtexels/sec
Difference: 13632 (41%)

Pixel Rate

If running with a high screen resolution is important to you, then the Radeon HD 6790 is the winner, though only just barely. (explain)

Radeon HD 6790 13440 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTS 250 1GB 11808 Mpixels/sec
Difference: 1632 (14%)

Please note that the above 'benchmarks' are all just theoretical - the results were calculated based on the card's specifications, and real-world performance may (and probably will) vary at least a bit.

Price Comparison

GeForce GTS 250 1GB

Amazon.com

Radeon HD 6790

Amazon.com

Please note that the price comparisons are based on search keywords - sometimes it might show cards with very similar names that are not exactly the same as the one chosen in the comparison. We do try to filter out the wrong results as best we can, though.

Specifications

Model GeForce GTS 250 1GB Radeon HD 6790
Manufacturer nVidia AMD
Year March 3, 2009 April 2011
Code Name G92a/b Barts LE
Fab Process 65/55 nm 40 nm
Bus PCIe x16 2.0 PCIe 2.1 x16
Memory 1024 MB 1024 MB
Core Speed 738 MHz 840 MHz
Shader Speed 1836 MHz (N/A) MHz
Memory Speed 1100 MHz (2200 MHz effective) 1050 MHz (4200 MHz effective)
Unified Shaders 128 800
Texture Mapping Units 64 40
Render Output Units 16 16
Bus Type GDDR3 GDDR5
Bus Width 256-bit 256-bit
DirectX Version DirectX 10 DirectX 11
OpenGL Version OpenGL 3.1 OpenGL 4.1
Power (Max TDP) 145 watts 150 watts
Shader Model 4.0 5.0
Bandwidth 70400 MB/sec 134400 MB/sec
Texel Rate 47232 Mtexels/sec 33600 Mtexels/sec
Pixel Rate 11808 Mpixels/sec 13440 Mpixels/sec

Memory Bandwidth: Memory bandwidth is the largest amount of data (in units of MB per second) that can be transported across the external memory interface within a second. It is worked out by multiplying the interface width by its memory speed. In the case of DDR type RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that are applied in one second. This number is calculated by multiplying the total amount of texture units of the card by the core clock speed of the chip. The higher the texel rate, the better the video card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels applied in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the video card can possibly record to the local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the number of ROPs by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel output rate also depends on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the max fill rate.

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