GeForce GTS 250 512MB vs Radeon HD 7970

Intro

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

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTS 250 512MB		145 Watts
Radeon HD 7970		250 Watts
	Difference: 105 Watts (72%)

Memory Bandwidth

The Radeon HD 7970, in theory, should perform quite a bit faster than the GeForce GTS 250 512MB overall. (explain)

Radeon HD 7970		264000 MB/sec
GeForce GTS 250 512MB		70400 MB/sec
	Difference: 193600 (275%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 7970 is quite a bit (more or less 151%) better at texture filtering than the GeForce GTS 250 512MB. (explain)

Radeon HD 7970		118400 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTS 250 512MB		47232 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 71168 (151%)

Pixel Rate

If using a high resolution is important to you, then the Radeon HD 7970 is a better choice, by far. (explain)

Radeon HD 7970		29600 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTS 250 512MB		11808 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 17792 (151%)

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 max amount of data (counted in MB per second) that can be moved across the external memory interface in one second. It's worked out by multiplying the bus width by the speed of its memory. If it uses DDR type RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and high 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 number of texture units by the core clock speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, the better the 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 that 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 number of colour ROPs by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel rate also depends on lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the max fill rate.