GeForce GTX 1060 3GB vs Radeon HD 4870 X2

Intro

Compare all that to the Radeon HD 4870 X2, which has clock speeds of 750 MHz on the GPU, and 900 MHz on the 1024 MB of GDDR5 memory. It features 800(160x5) SPUs as well as 40 TAUs and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 1060 3GB		120 Watts
Radeon HD 4870 X2		350 Watts
	Difference: 230 Watts (192%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the Radeon HD 4870 X2 will be 17% faster than the GeForce GTX 1060 3GB in general, because of its higher data rate. (explain)

Radeon HD 4870 X2		230400 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 1060 3GB		196608 MB/sec
	Difference: 33792 (17%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 1060 3GB should be quite a bit (about 81%) more effective at texture filtering than the Radeon HD 4870 X2. (explain)

GeForce GTX 1060 3GB		108432 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 4870 X2		60000 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 48432 (81%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 1060 3GB is a lot (more or less 201%) faster with regards to full screen anti-aliasing than the Radeon HD 4870 X2, and also capable of handling higher resolutions more effectively. (explain)

GeForce GTX 1060 3GB		72288 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4870 X2		24000 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 48288 (201%)

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.

One or more cards in this comparison are multi-core. This means that their bandwidth, texel and pixel rates are theoretically doubled - this does not mean the card will actually perform twice as fast, but only that it should in theory be able to. Actual game benchmarks will give a more accurate idea of what it's capable of.

Price Comparison

Specifications

Memory Bandwidth: Memory bandwidth is the max amount of data (counted in MB per second) that can be transported across the external memory interface in one second. It's calculated by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory speed. In the case of DDR RAM, it should 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 AA, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels that the graphics card can possibly write to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the number of Render Output Units by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel rate is also dependant on lots of other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the max fill rate.