GeForce GTX 560 vs Radeon HD 4850 1GB

Intro

Compare those specifications to the Radeon HD 4850 1GB, which comes with a clock speed of 625 MHz and a GDDR4 memory frequency of 993 MHz. It also features a 256-bit bus, and uses a 55 nm design. It features 800(160x5) SPUs, 40 Texture Address Units, and 16 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 4850 1GB		110 Watts
GeForce GTX 560		150 Watts
	Difference: 40 Watts (36%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GTX 560 should in theory be a lot faster than the Radeon HD 4850 1GB in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 560		128128 MB/sec
Radeon HD 4850 1GB		63552 MB/sec
	Difference: 64576 (102%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 560 is quite a bit (more or less 81%) better at texture filtering than the Radeon HD 4850 1GB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 560		45360 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 4850 1GB		25000 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 20360 (81%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 560 should be a lot (more or less 159%) better at FSAA than the Radeon HD 4850 1GB, and will be able to handle higher screen resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

GeForce GTX 560		25920 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4850 1GB		10000 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 15920 (159%)

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

Specifications

Memory Bandwidth: Memory bandwidth is the max amount of data (in units of MB per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface in one second. The number is worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 once 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 higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that are processed in one second. This is worked out by multiplying the total texture units by the core clock speed of the chip. The better this number, the better the 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 most pixels that the graphics card can possibly write to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel fill rate is also dependant on lots of other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the maximum fill rate.