GeForce GTX 860M vs Radeon HD 4870 2GB

Intro

Compare those specifications to the Radeon HD 4870 2GB, which features a clock frequency of 750 MHz and a GDDR5 memory speed of 900 MHz. It also features a 256-bit memory bus, and uses a 55 nm design. It is comprised of 800(160x5) SPUs, 40 TAUs, and 16 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 860M		45 Watts
Radeon HD 4870 2GB		150 Watts
	Difference: 105 Watts (233%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the Radeon HD 4870 2GB will be 80% quicker than the GeForce GTX 860M in general, because of its higher bandwidth. (explain)

Radeon HD 4870 2GB		115200 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 860M		64000 MB/sec
	Difference: 51200 (80%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 860M will be much (more or less 155%) more effective at anisotropic filtering than the Radeon HD 4870 2GB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 860M		76512 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 4870 2GB		30000 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 46512 (155%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 860M is a bit (more or less 6%) faster with regards to AA than the Radeon HD 4870 2GB, and also will be able to handle higher resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

GeForce GTX 860M		12752 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4870 2GB		12000 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 752 (6%)

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 max amount of data (measured in MB per second) that can be transported across the external memory interface in one second. The number is worked out by multiplying the interface width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR memory, the result 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, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the graphics card could possibly write to the local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the number of Raster Operations Pipelines by the the core 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 many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the maximum fill rate.