GeForce GT 1030 vs Radeon HD 4870 512MB

Intro

Compare all of that to the Radeon HD 4870 512MB, which comes with a core clock frequency of 750 MHz and a GDDR5 memory speed of 900 MHz. It also makes use of a 256-bit bus, and makes use of a 55 nm design. It is made up of 800(160x5) SPUs, 40 TAUs, and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GT 1030		30 Watts
Radeon HD 4870 512MB		150 Watts
	Difference: 120 Watts (400%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the Radeon HD 4870 512MB should be 134% quicker than the GeForce GT 1030 in general, due to its higher data rate. (explain)

Radeon HD 4870 512MB		115200 MB/sec
GeForce GT 1030		49152 MB/sec
	Difference: 66048 (134%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GT 1030 will be much (more or less 35%) faster with regards to anisotropic filtering than the Radeon HD 4870 512MB. (explain)

GeForce GT 1030		40480 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 4870 512MB		30000 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 10480 (35%)

Pixel Rate

If running with lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the GeForce GT 1030 is superior to the Radeon HD 4870 512MB, by a large margin. (explain)

GeForce GT 1030		20240 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4870 512MB		12000 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 8240 (69%)

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 past the external memory interface in a second. It is worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory speed. If the card has DDR type memory, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. 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 amount of texture map elements (texels) that can be processed per second. This figure is calculated by multiplying the total amount of texture units of the card by the core 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 processed in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels that the graphics chip could possibly record to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the number of colour ROPs by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the maximum fill rate.