Radeon HD 3850 X2 vs Radeon HD 6670 (OEM) 1GB

Intro

Compare those specifications to the Radeon HD 6670 (OEM) 1GB, which has a core clock speed of 800 MHz and a GDDR5 memory frequency of 1000 MHz. It also features a 128-bit memory bus, and uses a 40 nm design. It is comprised of 480 SPUs, 24 TAUs, and 8 Raster Operation Units.

(No game benchmarks for this combination yet.)

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the Radeon HD 3850 X2 is 66% faster than the Radeon HD 6670 (OEM) 1GB overall, due to its greater data rate. (explain)

Radeon HD 3850 X2		105984 MB/sec
Radeon HD 6670 (OEM) 1GB		64000 MB/sec
	Difference: 41984 (66%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 3850 X2 will be a little bit (approximately 11%) better at AF than the Radeon HD 6670 (OEM) 1GB. (explain)

Radeon HD 3850 X2		21376 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 6670 (OEM) 1GB		19200 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 2176 (11%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon HD 3850 X2 will be much (approximately 234%) more effective at anti-aliasing than the Radeon HD 6670 (OEM) 1GB, and also will be able to handle higher resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

Radeon HD 3850 X2		21376 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 6670 (OEM) 1GB		6400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 14976 (234%)

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.

One or more cards in this comparison are multi-core. This means that their bandwidth, texel and pixel rates are theoretically doubled - this does not mean the card will actually perform twice as fast, but only that it should in theory be able to. Actual game benchmarks will give a more accurate idea of what it's capable of.

Price Comparison

Specifications

Memory Bandwidth: Memory bandwidth is the max amount of data (counted in megabytes per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface within a second. It is worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by the speed of its memory. If the card has DDR type memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the bandwidth is, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum amount of texture map elements (texels) that can be processed per second. This figure is worked out by multiplying the total texture units by the core speed of the chip. The better this number, the better the graphics card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels that the graphics chip could possibly record to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the number of Raster Operations Pipelines by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel output rate is also dependant on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the maximum fill rate.