GeForce GTX 570 vs Radeon R9 M290X

Intro

Compare those specs to the Radeon R9 M290X, which makes use of a 28 nm design. AMD has set the core speed at 850 MHz. The GDDR5 RAM runs at a speed of 1200 MHz on this particular model. It features 1280 SPUs along with 80 TAUs and 32 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon R9 M290X		100 Watts
GeForce GTX 570		219 Watts
	Difference: 119 Watts (119%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the Radeon R9 M290X should be 1% quicker than the GeForce GTX 570 in general, due to its higher bandwidth. (explain)

Radeon R9 M290X		153600 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 570		152000 MB/sec
	Difference: 1600 (1%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon R9 M290X should be much (more or less 55%) more effective at AF than the GeForce GTX 570. (explain)

Radeon R9 M290X		68000 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 570		43920 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 24080 (55%)

Pixel Rate

If running with lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 570 is the winner, but not by far. (explain)

GeForce GTX 570		29280 Mpixels/sec
Radeon R9 M290X		27200 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 2080 (8%)

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 data (counted in megabytes per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface in a second. The number is worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by the speed of its memory. If the card has DDR type memory, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels that the graphics card can possibly record to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the number of ROPs by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel output rate also depends on lots of other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the max fill rate.