GeForce GTX 280 vs Radeon R9 M295X

Intro

Compare all that to the Radeon R9 M295X, which makes use of a 28 nm design. AMD has set the core speed at 750 MHz. The GDDR5 memory works at a speed of 1375 MHz on this specific model. It features 2048 SPUs along with 128 TAUs and 32 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon R9 M295X		125 Watts
GeForce GTX 280		236 Watts
	Difference: 111 Watts (89%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the Radeon R9 M295X should be 24% faster than the GeForce GTX 280 in general, due to its higher bandwidth. (explain)

Radeon R9 M295X		176000 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 280		141696 MB/sec
	Difference: 34304 (24%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon R9 M295X will be much (more or less 99%) better at texture filtering than the GeForce GTX 280. (explain)

Radeon R9 M295X		96000 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 280		48160 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 47840 (99%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon R9 M295X will be a lot (about 25%) faster with regards to FSAA than the GeForce GTX 280, and also should be able to handle higher screen resolutions without slowing down too much. (explain)

Radeon R9 M295X		24000 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 280		19264 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 4736 (25%)

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 transferred past the external memory interface in a second. It is worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR type memory, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels the graphics card can possibly write to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is worked out by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel output rate also depends on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.