GeForce GTX 260 vs Radeon HD 7770

Intro

Compare those specs to the Radeon HD 7770, which has core clock speeds of 1000 MHz on the GPU, and 1125 MHz on the 1024 MB of GDDR5 memory. It features 640 SPUs as well as 40 TAUs and 16 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 7770		80 Watts
GeForce GTX 260		182 Watts
	Difference: 102 Watts (128%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the GeForce GTX 260 should be 55% quicker than the Radeon HD 7770 in general, due to its higher data rate. (explain)

GeForce GTX 260		111888 MB/sec
Radeon HD 7770		72000 MB/sec
	Difference: 39888 (55%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 7770 will be just a bit (approximately 9%) faster with regards to AF than the GeForce GTX 260. (explain)

Radeon HD 7770		40000 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 260		36864 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 3136 (9%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 260 will be a little bit (approximately 1%) more effective at full screen anti-aliasing than the Radeon HD 7770, and also should be able to handle higher resolutions without slowing down too much. (explain)

GeForce GTX 260		16128 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 7770		16000 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 128 (1%)

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 (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 interface width by its memory speed. In the case of DDR type memory, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the bandwidth is, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and higher screen 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 speed of the chip. The higher this number, the better the card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels per second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels that the graphics chip could possibly write to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is worked out by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel rate also depends on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the max fill rate.