GeForce GTX 560 vs Radeon HD 3850 256MB

Intro

Compare that to the Radeon HD 3850 256MB, which comes with a GPU core clock speed of 668 MHz, and 256 MB of GDDR3 RAM set to run at 828 MHz through a 256-bit bus. It also is comprised of 320(64x5) Stream Processors, 16 Texture Address Units, and 16 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 3850 256MB		75 Watts
GeForce GTX 560		150 Watts
	Difference: 75 Watts (100%)

Memory Bandwidth

Performance-wise, the GeForce GTX 560 should in theory be much superior to the Radeon HD 3850 256MB overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 560		128128 MB/sec
Radeon HD 3850 256MB		52992 MB/sec
	Difference: 75136 (142%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 560 is quite a bit (approximately 324%) more effective at texture filtering than the Radeon HD 3850 256MB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 560		45360 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 3850 256MB		10688 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 34672 (324%)

Pixel Rate

If running with a high screen resolution is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 560 is a better choice, by far. (explain)

GeForce GTX 560		25920 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 3850 256MB		10688 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 15232 (143%)

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

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that can be applied in one second. This figure is calculated by multiplying the total number of texture units by the core speed of the chip. The higher this number, 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 maximum number of pixels the graphics card could possibly write to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel output rate is also dependant on lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.