GeForce GTX 850M vs GeForce GTX 980M

Intro

Compare all that to the GeForce GTX 980M, which features GPU core speed of 1038 MHz, and 4096 MB of GDDR5 memory set to run at 1000 MHz through a 256-bit bus. It also is comprised of 1536 SPUs, 96 Texture Address Units, and 64 ROPs.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

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 980M		9476 points
GeForce GTX 850M		3340 points
	Difference: 6136 (184%)

Zcash Mining Hash Rate

GeForce GTX 980M		155 Sol/s
GeForce GTX 850M		49 Sol/s
	Difference: 106 (216%)

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 850M		40 Watts
GeForce GTX 980M		100 Watts
	Difference: 60 Watts (150%)

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the GeForce GTX 980M should theoretically be quite a bit better than the GeForce GTX 850M overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 980M		128000 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 850M		32000 MB/sec
	Difference: 96000 (300%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 980M should be a lot (about 184%) better at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce GTX 850M. (explain)

GeForce GTX 980M		99648 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 850M		35040 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 64608 (184%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 980M will be quite a bit (more or less 374%) faster with regards to anti-aliasing than the GeForce GTX 850M, and also should be capable of handling higher resolutions more effectively. (explain)

GeForce GTX 980M		66432 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 850M		14016 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 52416 (374%)

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 information (in units of MB per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface in a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the interface width by its memory speed. In the case of DDR memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses 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, HDR and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum amount of texture map elements (texels) that are applied per second. This number is worked out by multiplying the total texture units by the core 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 in one second.

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