Radeon HD 3870 X2 512MB vs Radeon RX 470 4GB

Intro

Compare those specs to the Radeon RX 470 4GB, which comes with core speeds of 926 MHz on the GPU, and 1650 MHz on the 4096 MB of GDDR5 memory. It features 2048 SPUs along with 128 TAUs and 32 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Memory Bandwidth

The Radeon RX 470 4GB should theoretically be much faster than the Radeon HD 3870 X2 512MB in general. (explain)

Radeon RX 470 4GB		211200 MB/sec
Radeon HD 3870 X2 512MB		115200 MB/sec
	Difference: 96000 (83%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon RX 470 4GB is much (approximately 349%) faster with regards to texture filtering than the Radeon HD 3870 X2 512MB. (explain)

Radeon RX 470 4GB		118528 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 3870 X2 512MB		26400 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 92128 (349%)

Pixel Rate

If using lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the Radeon RX 470 4GB is a better choice, though not by far. (explain)

Radeon RX 470 4GB		29632 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 3870 X2 512MB		26400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 3232 (12%)

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 maximum amount of data (in units of MB per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface within a second. It's worked out by multiplying the bus width by the speed of its memory. If it uses DDR type memory, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the card's 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 amount of texture map elements (texels) that are processed in one second. This figure is worked out by multiplying the total texture units by the core speed of the chip. The higher this number, the better the graphics card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels the graphics card can possibly record to the local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is worked out by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel fill rate is also dependant 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 max fill rate.