Radeon HD 3870 X2 1GB vs Radeon R7 250

Intro

Compare that to the Radeon R7 250, which makes use of a 28 nm design. AMD has set the core frequency at 1000 MHz. The GDDR5 memory runs at a speed of 1150 MHz on this model. It features 384 SPUs as well as 24 TAUs and 8 ROPs.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the Radeon HD 3870 X2 1GB will be 96% quicker than the Radeon R7 250 in general, because of its greater data rate. (explain)

Radeon HD 3870 X2 1GB		144128 MB/sec
Radeon R7 250		73600 MB/sec
	Difference: 70528 (96%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 3870 X2 1GB will be a bit (approximately 10%) better at texture filtering than the Radeon R7 250. (explain)

Radeon HD 3870 X2 1GB		26400 Mtexels/sec
Radeon R7 250		24000 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 2400 (10%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon HD 3870 X2 1GB will be a lot (approximately 230%) more effective at AA than the Radeon R7 250, and also will be able to handle higher resolutions more effectively. (explain)

Radeon HD 3870 X2 1GB		26400 Mpixels/sec
Radeon R7 250		8000 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 18400 (230%)

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.

One or more cards in this comparison are multi-core. This means that their bandwidth, texel and pixel rates are theoretically doubled - this does not mean the card will actually perform twice as fast, but only that it should in theory be able to. Actual game benchmarks will give a more accurate idea of what it's capable of.

Price Comparison

Specifications

Memory Bandwidth: Memory bandwidth is the maximum amount of information (counted in megabytes per second) that can be transferred past the external memory interface within a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the interface width by its memory clock speed. If the card has DDR type RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that are processed per second. This number is worked out by multiplying the total texture units of the card by the core 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 applied in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels that the graphics card could possibly write to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the amount of Render Output Units by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel fill rate is also dependant on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the maximum fill rate.