Radeon HD 4850 512MB vs Radeon HD 5770

Intro

Compare those specifications to the Radeon HD 5770, which has GPU core speed of 850 MHz, and 1024 MB of GDDR5 memory running at 1200 MHz through a 128-bit bus. It also is comprised of 800(160x5) SPUs, 40 Texture Address Units, and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 5770		108 Watts
Radeon HD 4850 512MB		110 Watts
	Difference: 2 Watts (2%)

Memory Bandwidth

The Radeon HD 5770, in theory, should perform a lot faster than the Radeon HD 4850 512MB in general. (explain)

Radeon HD 5770		76800 MB/sec
Radeon HD 4850 512MB		63552 MB/sec
	Difference: 13248 (21%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 5770 should be a lot (more or less 36%) better at texture filtering than the Radeon HD 4850 512MB. (explain)

Radeon HD 5770		34000 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 4850 512MB		25000 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 9000 (36%)

Pixel Rate

If using lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the Radeon HD 5770 is a better choice, and very much so. (explain)

Radeon HD 5770		13600 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4850 512MB		10000 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 3600 (36%)

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 information (counted in MB per second) that can be transferred across the external memory interface within a second. The number is worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by the speed of its memory. If the card has DDR memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that can be applied in one second. This number is worked out by multiplying the total amount of texture units by the core clock speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, the better the video 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 most pixels that the graphics chip can possibly record to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the number of Render Output Units by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel fill 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 get to the maximum fill rate.