GeForce GT 1030 vs Radeon HD 3870 1GB

Intro

Compare all that to the Radeon HD 3870 1GB, which features core speeds of 775 MHz on the GPU, and 1125 MHz on the 1024 MB of GDDR4 RAM. It features 320(64x5) SPUs along with 16 TAUs and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GT 1030		30 Watts
Radeon HD 3870 1GB		106 Watts
	Difference: 76 Watts (253%)

Memory Bandwidth

The Radeon HD 3870 1GB should theoretically perform quite a bit faster than the GeForce GT 1030 in general. (explain)

Radeon HD 3870 1GB		72000 MB/sec
GeForce GT 1030		49152 MB/sec
	Difference: 22848 (46%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GT 1030 should be much (about 226%) better at texture filtering than the Radeon HD 3870 1GB. (explain)

GeForce GT 1030		40480 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 3870 1GB		12400 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 28080 (226%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GT 1030 is quite a bit (more or less 63%) better at AA than the Radeon HD 3870 1GB, and capable of handling higher screen resolutions better. (explain)

GeForce GT 1030		20240 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 3870 1GB		12400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 7840 (63%)

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: Bandwidth is the maximum amount of information (measured in megabytes per second) that can be transported past the external memory interface in a second. It's worked out by multiplying the bus width by its memory clock speed. If the card has DDR type RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the card's memory bandwidth, 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 number of texture map elements (texels) that can be applied in one second. This figure is calculated by multiplying the total texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The higher the texel rate, the better the video card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels per second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels the graphics card can possibly record to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the number of colour ROPs by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel 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.