GeForce GTX 1060 3GB vs Radeon HD 6950 2GB

Intro

Compare those specs to the Radeon HD 6950 2GB, which has a core clock frequency of 800 MHz and a GDDR5 memory speed of 1250 MHz. It also makes use of a 256-bit bus, and makes use of a 40 nm design. It features 1408 SPUs, 88 Texture Address Units, and 32 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 1060 3GB		120 Watts
Radeon HD 6950 2GB		200 Watts
	Difference: 80 Watts (67%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GTX 1060 3GB should theoretically perform a lot faster than the Radeon HD 6950 2GB overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 1060 3GB		196608 MB/sec
Radeon HD 6950 2GB		160000 MB/sec
	Difference: 36608 (23%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 1060 3GB should be much (approximately 54%) better at texture filtering than the Radeon HD 6950 2GB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 1060 3GB		108432 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 6950 2GB		70400 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 38032 (54%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 1060 3GB is a lot (more or less 182%) better at full screen anti-aliasing than the Radeon HD 6950 2GB, and will be capable of handling higher resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

GeForce GTX 1060 3GB		72288 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 6950 2GB		25600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 46688 (182%)

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 (counted in megabytes per second) that can be transported past the external memory interface in a second. It's calculated by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory clock speed. If the card has DDR memory, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the bandwidth is, 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 texture map elements (texels) that can be processed per second. This is worked out by multiplying the total amount of 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 in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the graphics card could possibly write to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the number of colour ROPs by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel output rate also depends on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the maximum fill rate.