GeForce GTS 250 512MB vs Radeon R7 240

Intro

Compare those specifications to the Radeon R7 240, which features a core clock frequency of 730 MHz and a DDR3 memory frequency of 900 MHz. It also makes use of a 128-bit memory bus, and uses a 28 nm design. It features 320 SPUs, 20 Texture Address Units, and 8 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon R7 240		30 Watts
GeForce GTS 250 512MB		145 Watts
	Difference: 115 Watts (383%)

Memory Bandwidth

Performance-wise, the GeForce GTS 250 512MB should in theory be quite a bit better than the Radeon R7 240 in general. (explain)

GeForce GTS 250 512MB		70400 MB/sec
Radeon R7 240		28800 MB/sec
	Difference: 41600 (144%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTS 250 512MB should be a lot (about 224%) faster with regards to anisotropic filtering than the Radeon R7 240. (explain)

GeForce GTS 250 512MB		47232 Mtexels/sec
Radeon R7 240		14600 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 32632 (224%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTS 250 512MB is much (more or less 102%) more effective at anti-aliasing than the Radeon R7 240, and also capable of handling higher resolutions better. (explain)

GeForce GTS 250 512MB		11808 Mpixels/sec
Radeon R7 240		5840 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 5968 (102%)

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 largest amount of data (measured in MB per second) that can be transported past the external memory interface within a second. It's calculated by multiplying the bus 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 AA, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum 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 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 most pixels that the graphics card can possibly write to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the number of ROPs 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 rate is also dependant on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the max fill rate.