GeForce GTX 260 vs Radeon HD 4870 1GB

Intro

Compare that to the Radeon HD 4870 1GB, which features a GPU core clock speed of 750 MHz, and 1024 MB of GDDR5 memory set to run at 900 MHz through a 256-bit bus. It also is comprised of 800(160x5) Stream Processors, 40 TAUs, and 16 ROPs.

Avatar

Settings:	Ultra High Quality
AA:	8x
AF:	none
Resolution:	1920x1200
Test Machine:	Tom's Hardware Test Machine (Source)

Radeon HD 4870 1GB		33 FPS
GeForce GTX 260		32 FPS
	Difference: 1 FPS (3%)

Battlefield Bad Company 2

Settings:	High Quality
AA:	4x
AF:	8x
Resolution:	1920x1200
Test Machine:	Tom's Hardware Test Machine (Source)

Radeon HD 4870 1GB		33 FPS
GeForce GTX 260		31 FPS
	Difference: 2 FPS (6%)

Crysis

Settings:	High Detail
AA:	4x
AF:	none
Resolution:	1680x1050
Test Machine:	Intel Core i5-750,Windows 7 Ultimate x64,3 x 2GB (Source)

Radeon HD 4870 1GB		38 FPS
GeForce GTX 260		34 FPS
	Difference: 4 FPS (12%)

F.E.A.R. 2

Settings:	Maximum Quality
AA:	4x
AF:	8x
Resolution:	1920x1200
Test Machine:	Unknown (Source)

Radeon HD 4870 1GB		78 FPS
GeForce GTX 260		60 FPS
	Difference: 18 FPS (30%)

Fallout 3

Settings:	Very High Quality
AA:	4x
AF:	8x
Resolution:	1680x1050
Test Machine:	Tom's Hardware Charts Test Rig (Source)

GeForce GTX 260		74 FPS
Radeon HD 4870 1GB		74 FPS
	Difference: 0 FPS (0%)

Left4Dead

Settings:	Very High Quality
AA:	4x
AF:	8x
Resolution:	1920x1200
Test Machine:	Tom's Hardware Charts Test Rig (Source)

Radeon HD 4870 1GB		80 FPS
GeForce GTX 260		74 FPS
	Difference: 6 FPS (8%)

Left4Dead 2

Settings:	Very High
AA:	8x
AF:	16x
Resolution:	1920x1200
Test Machine:	Tom's Hardware Test Machine (Source)

Radeon HD 4870 1GB		80 FPS
GeForce GTX 260		69 FPS
	Difference: 11 FPS (16%)

Mass Effect 2

Settings:	Maximum Quality
AA:	none
AF:	8x
Resolution:	1920x1200
Test Machine:	Tom's Hardware Test Machine (Source)

Radeon HD 4870 1GB		98 FPS
GeForce GTX 260		91 FPS
	Difference: 7 FPS (8%)

Supreme Commander 2

Settings:	High
AA:	8x
AF:	16x
Resolution:	1920x1200
Test Machine:	Tom's Hardware Test Machine (Source)

Radeon HD 4870 1GB		57 FPS
GeForce GTX 260		34 FPS
	Difference: 23 FPS (68%)

Tom Clancy's Endwar

Settings:	High Quality
AA:	4x
AF:	8x
Resolution:	1920x1200
Test Machine:	Tom's Hardware Test Machine (Source)

Radeon HD 4870 1GB		30 FPS
GeForce GTX 260		24 FPS
	Difference: 6 FPS (25%)

Tom Clancy's H.A.W.X

Settings:	High Quality
AA:	4x
AF:	8x
Resolution:	1680x1050
Test Machine:	Tom's Hardware Charts Test Rig (Source)

GeForce GTX 260		47 FPS
Radeon HD 4870 1GB		36 FPS
	Difference: 11 FPS (31%)

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Radeon HD 4870 1GB wins

(Based entirely on the benchmarks listed above)

When combining all game benchmark scores on this page together, the Radeon HD 4870 1GB wins overall, by 67 FPS. Please note that we do not have the results of every benchmark ever done for these cards, so the results may differ wildly in different games.

Radeon HD 4870 1GB		637 FPS
GeForce GTX 260		570 FPS
	Difference: 67 FPS (12%)

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 4870 1GB		150 Watts
GeForce GTX 260		182 Watts
	Difference: 32 Watts (21%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the Radeon HD 4870 1GB should be a little bit faster than the GeForce GTX 260 overall. (explain)

Radeon HD 4870 1GB		115200 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 260		111888 MB/sec
	Difference: 3312 (3%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 260 should be much (more or less 23%) better at anisotropic filtering than the Radeon HD 4870 1GB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 260		36864 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 4870 1GB		30000 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 6864 (23%)

Pixel Rate

If running with lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 260 is a better choice, by far. (explain)

GeForce GTX 260		16128 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4870 1GB		12000 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 4128 (34%)

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: Bandwidth is the largest amount of data (measured in MB per second) that can be moved over the external memory interface within a second. The number is worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory speed. If the card has DDR type RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, 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 can be processed in one second. This number is worked out by multiplying the total number of texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The higher the texel rate, the better the 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 can possibly write to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is worked out by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the max fill rate.