Radeon HD 4550 512MB vs Radeon HD 5450

Intro

Compare that to the Radeon HD 5450, which makes use of a 40 nm design. AMD has set the core frequency at 650 MHz. The DDR3 memory is set to run at a frequency of 800 MHz on this specific model. It features 80(16x5) SPUs along with 8 Texture Address Units and 4 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 5450		19 Watts
Radeon HD 4550 512MB		25 Watts
	Difference: 6 Watts (32%)

Memory Bandwidth

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

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 5450 should be a little bit (about 8%) faster with regards to texture filtering than the Radeon HD 4550 512MB. (explain)

Radeon HD 5450		5200 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 4550 512MB		4800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 400 (8%)

Pixel Rate

If using a high resolution is important to you, then the Radeon HD 5450 is the winner, though only just barely. (explain)

Radeon HD 5450		2600 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4550 512MB		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: Memory bandwidth is the largest amount of data (measured in megabytes per second) that can be moved across the external memory interface in one second. The number is worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory speed. If the card has DDR memory, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the bandwidth is, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the video card could possibly record to the local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the amount of Render Output Units by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel fill rate is also dependant on lots of other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the max fill rate.