GeForce GTX 280 vs GeForce GTX 980

Intro

Compare that to the GeForce GTX 980, which comes with core speeds of 1126 MHz on the GPU, and 1750 MHz on the 4096 MB of GDDR5 memory. It features 2048 SPUs as well as 128 Texture Address Units and 64 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 980		165 Watts
GeForce GTX 280		236 Watts
	Difference: 71 Watts (43%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically, the GeForce GTX 980 should be quite a bit faster than the GeForce GTX 280 overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 980		224000 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 280		141696 MB/sec
	Difference: 82304 (58%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 980 is a lot (more or less 199%) faster with regards to AF than the GeForce GTX 280. (explain)

GeForce GTX 980		144128 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 280		48160 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 95968 (199%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 980 is a lot (about 274%) faster with regards to FSAA than the GeForce GTX 280, and also able to handle higher resolutions without slowing down too much. (explain)

GeForce GTX 980		72064 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 280		19264 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 52800 (274%)

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 maximum amount of data (measured in megabytes per second) that can be transferred past the external memory interface in one second. It's calculated by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory clock speed. If the card has DDR type RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that are processed in one second. This is calculated by multiplying the total amount of texture units of the card by the core clock speed of the chip. The higher the texel rate, the better the card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels processed in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels that the graphics card could possibly write to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the amount of Raster Operations Pipelines 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 also depends on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.