GeForce GTX 950 vs GeForce GTX 970

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GTX 970, which makes use of a 28 nm design. nVidia has set the core speed at 1050 MHz. The GDDR5 memory works at a speed of 1750 MHz on this specific model. It features 1664 SPUs as well as 104 TAUs 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

GeForce GTX 970		10867 points
GeForce GTX 950		6536 points
	Difference: 4331 (66%)

Ethereum Mining Hash Rate

GeForce GTX 970		19 Mh/s
GeForce GTX 950		10 Mh/s
	Difference: 9 (90%)

Zcash Mining Hash Rate

GeForce GTX 970		262 Sol/s
GeForce GTX 950		155 Sol/s
	Difference: 107 (69%)

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 950		90 Watts
GeForce GTX 970		145 Watts
	Difference: 55 Watts (61%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the GeForce GTX 970 should be 112% quicker than the GeForce GTX 950 overall, because of its higher bandwidth. (explain)

GeForce GTX 970		224000 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 950		105728 MB/sec
	Difference: 118272 (112%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 970 should be a lot (about 122%) more effective at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce GTX 950. (explain)

GeForce GTX 970		109200 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 950		49152 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 60048 (122%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 970 is a lot (more or less 105%) more effective at anti-aliasing than the GeForce GTX 950, and also will be able to handle higher resolutions better. (explain)

GeForce GTX 970		67200 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 950		32768 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 34432 (105%)

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 (in units of megabytes per second) that can be transferred across the external memory interface in a second. It's worked out by multiplying the interface width by its memory clock speed. In the case of DDR RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, the better 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 can be applied in one second. This figure is calculated by multiplying the total number of texture units by the core clock speed of the chip. The better this number, the better the card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels applied in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels that the graphics card could possibly write to its local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel rate is also dependant on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.