GeForce GTX 460 SE vs Radeon R9 270X

Intro

Compare that to the Radeon R9 270X, which features GPU core speed of 1000 MHz, and 2048 MB of GDDR5 RAM running at 1400 MHz through a 256-bit bus. It also is comprised of 1280 SPUs, 80 TAUs, and 32 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 460 SE		150 Watts
Radeon R9 270X		180 Watts
	Difference: 30 Watts (20%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the Radeon R9 270X is 65% faster than the GeForce GTX 460 SE overall, because of its higher bandwidth. (explain)

Radeon R9 270X		179200 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 460 SE		108800 MB/sec
	Difference: 70400 (65%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon R9 270X should be quite a bit (more or less 156%) faster with regards to anisotropic filtering than the GeForce GTX 460 SE. (explain)

Radeon R9 270X		80000 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 460 SE		31200 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 48800 (156%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon R9 270X is much (about 54%) better at full screen anti-aliasing than the GeForce GTX 460 SE, and also capable of handling higher screen resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

Radeon R9 270X		32000 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 460 SE		20800 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 11200 (54%)

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 information (counted in MB per second) that can be transferred across the external memory interface within a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the bus width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the bandwidth is, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that are processed in one second. This is worked out by multiplying the total texture units of the card by the core clock speed of the chip. The higher the texel rate, the better the graphics card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels applied in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels the video card could possibly write to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the amount of colour 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 fill rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the maximum fill rate.