Radeon HD 4550 256MB vs Radeon HD 5450

Intro

Compare those specifications to the Radeon HD 5450, which has GPU core speed of 650 MHz, and 512 MB of DDR3 RAM running at 800 MHz through a 64-bit bus. It also features 80(16x5) SPUs, 8 TAUs, and 4 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 5450		19 Watts
Radeon HD 4550 256MB		25 Watts
	Difference: 6 Watts (32%)

Memory Bandwidth

Both cards have the exact same memory bandwidth, so in theory they should perform exactly the same. (explain)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 5450 will be a bit (about 8%) faster with regards to texture filtering than the Radeon HD 4550 256MB. (explain)

Radeon HD 5450		5200 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 4550 256MB		4800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 400 (8%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon HD 5450 will be a little bit (more or less 8%) more effective at anti-aliasing than the Radeon HD 4550 256MB, and also should be able to handle higher screen resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

Radeon HD 5450		2600 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4550 256MB		2400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 200 (8%)

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 MB per second) that can be transferred past the external memory interface within a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the interface width by the speed of its memory. If it uses DDR memory, it must be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels that the graphics card can possibly write to its 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 clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel fill rate is also dependant on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the maximum fill rate.