GeForce GTX 860M vs Radeon HD 4550 512MB

Intro

Compare all that to the Radeon HD 4550 512MB, which features a core clock frequency of 600 MHz and a GDDR3 memory frequency of 800 MHz. It also makes use of a 64-bit memory bus, and uses a 55 nm design. It features 80(16x5) SPUs, 8 TAUs, and 4 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 4550 512MB		25 Watts
GeForce GTX 860M		45 Watts
	Difference: 20 Watts (80%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the GeForce GTX 860M should be much faster than the Radeon HD 4550 512MB in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 860M		64000 MB/sec
Radeon HD 4550 512MB		12800 MB/sec
	Difference: 51200 (400%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 860M is quite a bit (about 1494%) faster with regards to anisotropic filtering than the Radeon HD 4550 512MB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 860M		76512 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 4550 512MB		4800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 71712 (1494%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 860M is quite a bit (about 431%) more effective at anti-aliasing than the Radeon HD 4550 512MB, and should be capable of handling higher resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

GeForce GTX 860M		12752 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4550 512MB		2400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 10352 (431%)

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 information (counted in MB per second) that can be transported past the external memory interface within a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR type RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that are processed per second. This number is worked out by multiplying the total number of texture units by the core speed of the chip. The higher the texel rate, 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 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. The figure is calculated by multiplying the amount of Render Output Units 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 is also dependant on lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the max fill rate.