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Radeon HD 3870 512MB vs Radeon HD 4670 512MB

Intro

The Radeon HD 3870 512MB features a GPU core clock speed of 775 MHz, and the 512 MB of GDDR3 RAM runs at 900 MHz through a 256-bit bus. It also is made up of 320(64x5) SPUs, 16 TAUs, and 16 Raster Operation Units.

Compare all that to the Radeon HD 4670 512MB, which has GPU clock speed of 750 MHz, and 512 MB of GDDR4/GDDR3/DDR3/DDR2 RAM set to run at 1000 MHz through a 128-bit bus. It also is made up of 320(64x5) Stream Processors, 32 Texture Address Units, and 8 ROPs.

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 4670 512MB 70 Watts
Radeon HD 3870 512MB 106 Watts
Difference: 36 Watts (51%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the Radeon HD 3870 512MB should be 80% quicker than the Radeon HD 4670 512MB in general, because of its higher bandwidth. (explain)

Radeon HD 3870 512MB 57600 MB/sec
Radeon HD 4670 512MB 32000 MB/sec
Difference: 25600 (80%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 4670 512MB is quite a bit (about 94%) better at anisotropic filtering than the Radeon HD 3870 512MB. (explain)

Radeon HD 4670 512MB 24000 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 3870 512MB 12400 Mtexels/sec
Difference: 11600 (94%)

Pixel Rate

If running with a high screen resolution is important to you, then the Radeon HD 3870 512MB is superior to the Radeon HD 4670 512MB, by far. (explain)

Radeon HD 3870 512MB 12400 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4670 512MB 6000 Mpixels/sec
Difference: 6400 (107%)

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

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Radeon HD 3870 512MB

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Radeon HD 4670 512MB

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Please note that the price comparisons are based on search keywords - sometimes it might show cards with very similar names that are not exactly the same as the one chosen in the comparison. We do try to filter out the wrong results as best we can, though.

Specifications

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Model Radeon HD 3870 512MB Radeon HD 4670 512MB
Manufacturer AMD AMD
Year Nov 19, 2007 Sep 10, 2008
Code Name RV670 XT RV730 XT
Memory 512 MB 512 MB
Core Speed 775 MHz 750 MHz
Memory Speed 1800 MHz 2000 MHz
Power (Max TDP) 106 watts 70 watts
Bandwidth 57600 MB/sec 32000 MB/sec
Texel Rate 12400 Mtexels/sec 24000 Mtexels/sec
Pixel Rate 12400 Mpixels/sec 6000 Mpixels/sec
Unified Shaders 320(64x5) 320(64x5)
Texture Mapping Units 16 32
Render Output Units 16 8
Bus Type GDDR3 GDDR4/GDDR3/DDR3/DDR2
Bus Width 256-bit 128-bit
Fab Process 55 nm 55 nm
Transistors (Unknown) million 514 million
Bus PCIe 2.0 x16/AGP 8x PCIe 2.0 x16, AGP 8x
DirectX Version DirectX 10.1 DirectX 10.1
OpenGL Version OpenGL 3.0 OpenGL 3.0

Memory Bandwidth: Bandwidth is the maximum amount of information (counted in megabytes per second) that can be transported across the external memory interface in a second. It's calculated by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that can be processed per second. This is calculated by multiplying the total number of texture units by the core speed of the chip. The better this number, the better the video 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 maximum number of pixels the video card could possibly write to the local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the amount of Raster Operations Pipelines by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the maximum fill rate.

Display Prices

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Radeon HD 3870 512MB

Amazon.com

Check prices at:

Radeon HD 4670 512MB

Amazon.com

Check prices at:

Please note that the price comparisons are based on search keywords - sometimes it might show cards with very similar names that are not exactly the same as the one chosen in the comparison. We do try to filter out the wrong results as best we can, though.

Comments

One Response to “Radeon HD 3870 512MB vs Radeon HD 4670 512MB”
BF3 Ram Usage - Electronic Arts UK Community says:

[...] 2GB RAM in the closed beta? Also for those who think a 4670 couldn't pass minimum requirements: Radeon HD 3870 512MB vs Radeon HD 4670 512MB – Performance Comparison Benchmarks @ Hardware Co... Interesting read..according to these statistics, HD4670 just about trumps the 3870 (minimum [...]

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