GeForce GTX 580 3GB vs Radeon HD 7970

Intro

Compare all of that to the Radeon HD 7970, which features a core clock frequency of 925 MHz and a GDDR5 memory speed of 1375 MHz. It also makes use of a 384-bit bus, and uses a 28 nm design. It is made up of 2048 SPUs, 128 Texture Address Units, and 32 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		244 Watts
Radeon HD 7970		250 Watts
	Difference: 6 Watts (2%)

Memory Bandwidth

Performance-wise, the Radeon HD 7970 should in theory be a lot better than the GeForce GTX 580 3GB overall. (explain)

Radeon HD 7970		264000 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 580 3GB		192384 MB/sec
	Difference: 71616 (37%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 7970 will be a lot (about 140%) more effective at AF than the GeForce GTX 580 3GB. (explain)

Radeon HD 7970		118400 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 580 3GB		49408 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 68992 (140%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 580 3GB will be quite a bit (about 25%) better at FSAA than the Radeon HD 7970, and also should be capable of handling higher screen resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		37056 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 7970		29600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 7456 (25%)

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 maximum amount of data (measured in MB per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface in a second. It's worked out by multiplying the interface width by its memory clock speed. In the case of DDR type RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels that the graphics card could possibly record to its local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the amount of Raster Operations Pipelines by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel output rate also depends on lots of other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.