GeForce GTX 1050 3GB vs GeForce GTX 970

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GTX 970, which has GPU core speed of 1050 MHz, and 4096 MB of GDDR5 RAM set to run at 1750 MHz through a 256-bit bus. It also is comprised of 1664 Stream Processors, 104 Texture Address Units, and 64 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 1050 3GB		75 Watts
GeForce GTX 970		145 Watts
	Difference: 70 Watts (93%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GTX 970, in theory, should perform quite a bit faster than the GeForce GTX 1050 3GB in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 970		224000 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 1050 3GB		86016 MB/sec
	Difference: 137984 (160%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 970 should be much (more or less 63%) better at texture filtering than the GeForce GTX 1050 3GB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 970		109200 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 1050 3GB		66816 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 42384 (63%)

Pixel Rate

If running with lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 970 is superior to the GeForce GTX 1050 3GB, and very much so. (explain)

GeForce GTX 970		67200 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 1050 3GB		33408 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 33792 (101%)

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 (in units of MB per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface in one second. It is worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory clock speed. In the case of DDR memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the 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 amount of texture map elements (texels) that can be processed in one second. This is worked out by multiplying the total texture units by the core speed of the chip. The better this number, the better the video 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 most pixels that the graphics card could possibly write to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is worked out by multiplying the amount of Raster Operations Pipelines by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called 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, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the maximum fill rate.