Radeon R9 280 vs Radeon R9 295X2

Intro

Compare those specs to the Radeon R9 295X2, which makes use of a 28 nm design. AMD has set the core frequency at 1018 MHz. The GDDR5 memory works at a frequency of 1250 MHz on this particular model. It features 2816 SPUs as well as 176 Texture Address Units and 64 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

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Benchmarks

These are real-world performance benchmarks that were submitted by Hardware Compare users. The scores seen here are the average of all benchmarks submitted for each respective test and hardware.

3DMark Fire Strike Graphics Score

Radeon R9 295X2		21205 points
Radeon R9 280		7961 points
	Difference: 13244 (166%)

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon R9 280		250 Watts
Radeon R9 295X2		500 Watts
	Difference: 250 Watts (100%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically, the Radeon R9 295X2 should perform a lot faster than the Radeon R9 280 in general. (explain)

Radeon R9 295X2		640000 MB/sec
Radeon R9 280		240000 MB/sec
	Difference: 400000 (167%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon R9 295X2 should be a lot (more or less 243%) more effective at texture filtering than the Radeon R9 280. (explain)

Radeon R9 295X2		358336 Mtexels/sec
Radeon R9 280		104496 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 253840 (243%)

Pixel Rate

If using lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the Radeon R9 295X2 is a better choice, by far. (explain)

Radeon R9 295X2		130304 Mpixels/sec
Radeon R9 280		29856 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 100448 (336%)

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 in a second. It's calculated by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory speed. If the card has DDR type memory, it must be multiplied by 2 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, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that can be processed per second. This figure is calculated by multiplying the total texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The better this number, the better the graphics card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels processed in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels that the graphics card could possibly write to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is worked out by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel rate also depends on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the max fill rate.