GeForce 9800 GT 512MB vs Radeon R9 380 4G

Intro

Compare those specifications to the Radeon R9 380 4G, which has a clock frequency of 970 MHz and a GDDR5 memory speed of 1425 MHz. It also uses a 256-bit bus, and makes use of a 28 nm design. It is comprised of 1792 SPUs, 112 Texture Address Units, and 32 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9800 GT 512MB		105 Watts
Radeon R9 380 4G		190 Watts
	Difference: 85 Watts (81%)

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the Radeon R9 380 4G should in theory be quite a bit superior to the GeForce 9800 GT 512MB overall. (explain)

Radeon R9 380 4G		182400 MB/sec
GeForce 9800 GT 512MB		57600 MB/sec
	Difference: 124800 (217%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon R9 380 4G will be much (approximately 223%) better at AF than the GeForce 9800 GT 512MB. (explain)

Radeon R9 380 4G		108640 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9800 GT 512MB		33600 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 75040 (223%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon R9 380 4G should be quite a bit (approximately 223%) better at FSAA than the GeForce 9800 GT 512MB, and also capable of handling higher resolutions better. (explain)

Radeon R9 380 4G		31040 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9800 GT 512MB		9600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 21440 (223%)

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 maximum amount of information (measured in MB per second) that can be transported across the external memory interface within a second. The number is worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory speed. If the card has DDR type RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels that the graphics chip could possibly record to its local memory in a 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 drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel rate is also dependant on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.