GeForce GTX 260 Core 216 vs Radeon R9 M280X

Intro

Compare those specs to the Radeon R9 M280X, which makes use of a 28 nm design. AMD has clocked the core speed at 900 MHz. The GDDR5 RAM is set to run at a frequency of 1375 MHz on this particular card. It features 896 SPUs along with 56 TAUs and 16 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon R9 M280X		75 Watts
GeForce GTX 260 Core 216		202 Watts
	Difference: 127 Watts (169%)

Memory Bandwidth

Performance-wise, the GeForce GTX 260 Core 216 should theoretically be much better than the Radeon R9 M280X overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 260 Core 216		111888 MB/sec
Radeon R9 M280X		88000 MB/sec
	Difference: 23888 (27%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon R9 M280X should be much (about 22%) better at texture filtering than the GeForce GTX 260 Core 216. (explain)

Radeon R9 M280X		50400 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 260 Core 216		41472 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 8928 (22%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 260 Core 216 is just a bit (approximately 12%) more effective at anti-aliasing than the Radeon R9 M280X, and will be able to handle higher screen resolutions more effectively. (explain)

GeForce GTX 260 Core 216		16128 Mpixels/sec
Radeon R9 M280X		14400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 1728 (12%)

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 (in units of MB per second) that can be transported over the external memory interface within a second. The number is worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR type RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher 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 are processed per second. This figure is calculated by multiplying the total number of texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The higher this number, the better the video 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 most pixels the graphics card could possibly record to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the amount of Raster Operations Pipelines by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel fill rate also depends on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the max fill rate.