GeForce GTX 580 3GB vs Radeon R7 250

Intro

Compare those specs to the Radeon R7 250, which features a core clock speed of 1000 MHz and a GDDR5 memory frequency of 1150 MHz. It also uses a 128-bit memory bus, and makes use of a 28 nm design. It is made up of 384 SPUs, 24 TAUs, and 8 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon R7 250		65 Watts
GeForce GTX 580 3GB		244 Watts
	Difference: 179 Watts (275%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce GTX 580 3GB is 161% quicker than the Radeon R7 250 in general, due to its higher bandwidth. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		192384 MB/sec
Radeon R7 250		73600 MB/sec
	Difference: 118784 (161%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 580 3GB will be much (approximately 106%) faster with regards to texture filtering than the Radeon R7 250. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		49408 Mtexels/sec
Radeon R7 250		24000 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 25408 (106%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 580 3GB will be quite a bit (about 363%) faster with regards to anti-aliasing than the Radeon R7 250, and should be able to handle higher screen resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		37056 Mpixels/sec
Radeon R7 250		8000 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 29056 (363%)

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 (in units of megabytes per second) that can be transferred across the external memory interface in a second. It's calculated by multiplying the card's interface width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR memory, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that are applied per second. This number is worked out by multiplying the total amount of texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The better this number, the better the video card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels applied 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 ROPs by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called 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 - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the maximum fill rate.