Radeon HD 4890 1GB vs Radeon R9 280X

Intro

Compare all of that to the Radeon R9 280X, which has a core clock frequency of 850 MHz and a GDDR5 memory frequency of 1500 MHz. It also makes use of a 384-bit memory bus, and makes use of a 28 nm design. It features 2048 SPUs, 128 TAUs, and 32 ROPs.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 4890 1GB		190 Watts
Radeon R9 280X		250 Watts
	Difference: 60 Watts (32%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the Radeon R9 280X should perform quite a bit faster than the Radeon HD 4890 1GB in general. (explain)

Radeon R9 280X		288000 MB/sec
Radeon HD 4890 1GB		124800 MB/sec
	Difference: 163200 (131%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon R9 280X should be much (more or less 172%) more effective at texture filtering than the Radeon HD 4890 1GB. (explain)

Radeon R9 280X		108800 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 4890 1GB		40000 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 68800 (172%)

Pixel Rate

If using lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the Radeon R9 280X is the winner, by far. (explain)

Radeon R9 280X		27200 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4890 1GB		16000 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 11200 (70%)

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 data (measured in megabytes per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface in one second. It's worked out by multiplying the bus width by its memory speed. In the case of DDR type memory, it must be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels that the graphics card could possibly record to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the number of Raster Operations Pipelines by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the maximum fill rate.