Radeon HD 5850 vs Radeon R9 270X

Intro

Compare that to the Radeon R9 270X, which features core clock speeds of 1000 MHz on the GPU, and 1400 MHz on the 2048 MB of GDDR5 memory. It features 1280 SPUs as well as 80 TAUs and 32 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 5850		151 Watts
Radeon R9 270X		180 Watts
	Difference: 29 Watts (19%)

Memory Bandwidth

Performance-wise, the Radeon R9 270X should theoretically be a lot better than the Radeon HD 5850 in general. (explain)

Radeon R9 270X		179200 MB/sec
Radeon HD 5850		128000 MB/sec
	Difference: 51200 (40%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon R9 270X should be a lot (more or less 53%) better at AF than the Radeon HD 5850. (explain)

Radeon R9 270X		80000 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 5850		52200 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 27800 (53%)

Pixel Rate

If using high levels of AA is important to you, then the Radeon R9 270X is the winner, by far. (explain)

Radeon R9 270X		32000 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 5850		23200 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 8800 (38%)

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 (in units of MB per second) that can be moved over the external memory interface in one second. It is calculated by multiplying the bus width by its memory speed. If the card has DDR memory, it must be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better 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 texture map elements (texels) that can be applied in one second. This figure is calculated by multiplying the total texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The higher this number, the better the graphics card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the graphics card can possibly record to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the amount of Raster Operations Pipelines by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel output rate also depends on quite a few other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the max fill rate.