GeForce GTX 980 vs Radeon HD 7850

Intro

Compare those specifications to the Radeon HD 7850, which features a core clock speed of 860 MHz and a GDDR5 memory frequency of 1200 MHz. It also uses a 256-bit memory bus, and makes use of a 28 nm design. It is made up of 1024 SPUs, 64 TAUs, and 32 ROPs.

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

GeForce GTX 980		13552 points
Radeon HD 7850		5200 points
	Difference: 8352 (161%)

Ethereum Mining Hash Rate

GeForce GTX 980		20 Mh/s
Radeon HD 7850		13 Mh/s
	Difference: 7 (54%)

Zcash Mining Hash Rate

GeForce GTX 980		408 Sol/s
Radeon HD 7850		171 Sol/s
	Difference: 237 (139%)

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 7850		130 Watts
GeForce GTX 980		165 Watts
	Difference: 35 Watts (27%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GTX 980, in theory, should perform a lot faster than the Radeon HD 7850 overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 980		224000 MB/sec
Radeon HD 7850		153600 MB/sec
	Difference: 70400 (46%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 980 will be a lot (about 162%) better at texture filtering than the Radeon HD 7850. (explain)

GeForce GTX 980		144128 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 7850		55040 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 89088 (162%)

Pixel Rate

If running with a high resolution is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 980 is superior to the Radeon HD 7850, by a large margin. (explain)

GeForce GTX 980		72064 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 7850		27520 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 44544 (162%)

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 max amount of data (in units of MB per second) that can be transferred past the external memory interface in a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the interface width by its memory speed. If it uses DDR type RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the bandwidth is, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that are processed per second. This number is calculated by multiplying the total texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The better 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 chip could possibly record to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the number of Render Output Units by the the core 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 output rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the maximum fill rate.