GeForce GT 230 vs Radeon HD 7870

Intro

Compare those specs to the Radeon HD 7870, which has GPU core speed of 1000 MHz, and 2048 MB of GDDR5 RAM running at 1200 MHz through a 256-bit bus. It also is comprised of 1280 SPUs, 80 TAUs, and 32 ROPs.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GT 230		65 Watts
Radeon HD 7870		175 Watts
	Difference: 110 Watts (169%)

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the Radeon HD 7870 should theoretically be much superior to the GeForce GT 230 overall. (explain)

Radeon HD 7870		153600 MB/sec
GeForce GT 230		38400 MB/sec
	Difference: 115200 (300%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 7870 is quite a bit (approximately 809%) better at texture filtering than the GeForce GT 230. (explain)

Radeon HD 7870		80000 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GT 230		8800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 71200 (809%)

Pixel Rate

If running with high levels of AA is important to you, then the Radeon HD 7870 is superior to the GeForce GT 230, by far. (explain)

Radeon HD 7870		32000 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GT 230		4400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 27600 (627%)

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 max amount of data (in units of MB per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface in one second. It's worked out by multiplying the interface width by the speed of its memory. If the card has DDR type RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 once 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, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum amount of texture map elements (texels) that can be applied in one second. This figure is worked out by multiplying the total 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 one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the graphics card can possibly record to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the amount of Raster Operations Pipelines 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 quite a few other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the maximum fill rate.