Radeon HD 3870 512MB vs Radeon HD 4350

Intro

Compare all that to the Radeon HD 4350, which makes use of a 55 nm design. AMD has set the core frequency at 575 MHz. The DDR2 RAM runs at a speed of 500 MHz on this card. It features 80(16x5) SPUs as well as 8 Texture Address Units and 4 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 4350		22 Watts
Radeon HD 3870 512MB		106 Watts
	Difference: 84 Watts (382%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the Radeon HD 3870 512MB should be a lot faster than the Radeon HD 4350 overall. (explain)

Radeon HD 3870 512MB		57600 MB/sec
Radeon HD 4350		8000 MB/sec
	Difference: 49600 (620%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 3870 512MB is a lot (more or less 170%) better at texture filtering than the Radeon HD 4350. (explain)

Radeon HD 3870 512MB		12400 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 4350		4600 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 7800 (170%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon HD 3870 512MB will be a lot (about 439%) better at AA than the Radeon HD 4350, and also capable of handling higher resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

Radeon HD 3870 512MB		12400 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4350		2300 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 10100 (439%)

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 data (counted in megabytes per second) that can be transported across the external memory interface within a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory clock speed. In the case of DDR type RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that are applied in one second. This is worked out by multiplying the total number of texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, the better the video card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels applied in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels that the graphics card can possibly write to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the amount of ROPs by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel rate is also dependant on lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the maximum fill rate.