GeForce GT 130 vs Radeon HD 7870

Intro

Compare those specifications to the Radeon HD 7870, which uses a 28 nm design. AMD has set the core speed at 1000 MHz. The GDDR5 memory is set to run at a frequency of 1200 MHz on this specific model. It features 1280 SPUs as well as 80 Texture Address Units and 32 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GT 130		75 Watts
Radeon HD 7870		175 Watts
	Difference: 100 Watts (133%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the Radeon HD 7870 is 1180% quicker than the GeForce GT 130 overall, due to its greater data rate. (explain)

Radeon HD 7870		153600 MB/sec
GeForce GT 130		12000 MB/sec
	Difference: 141600 (1180%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 7870 will be quite a bit (more or less 567%) better at AF than the GeForce GT 130. (explain)

Radeon HD 7870		80000 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GT 130		12000 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 68000 (567%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon HD 7870 is much (approximately 300%) faster with regards to AA than the GeForce GT 130, and should be capable of handling higher resolutions without slowing down too much. (explain)

Radeon HD 7870		32000 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GT 130		8000 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 24000 (300%)

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 (in units of megabytes per second) that can be transported past the external memory interface within a second. The number is worked out by multiplying the bus width by its memory speed. If it uses DDR RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the graphics card could possibly write to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the number of Render Output Units by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel fill rate also depends on quite a few 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.