GeForce 9800 GX2 vs Radeon HD 4870 X2

Intro

Compare those specifications to the Radeon HD 4870 X2, which has a core clock speed of 750 MHz and a GDDR5 memory frequency of 900 MHz. It also makes use of a 256-bit bus, and makes use of a 55 nm design. It is comprised of 800(160x5) SPUs, 40 TAUs, and 16 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9800 GX2		197 Watts
Radeon HD 4870 X2		350 Watts
	Difference: 153 Watts (78%)

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the Radeon HD 4870 X2 should in theory be quite a bit superior to the GeForce 9800 GX2 in general. (explain)

Radeon HD 4870 X2		230400 MB/sec
GeForce 9800 GX2		128000 MB/sec
	Difference: 102400 (80%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9800 GX2 is much (more or less 28%) more effective at texture filtering than the Radeon HD 4870 X2. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GX2		76800 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 4870 X2		60000 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 16800 (28%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon HD 4870 X2 should be quite a bit (approximately 25%) faster with regards to FSAA than the GeForce 9800 GX2, and also will be capable of handling higher resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

Radeon HD 4870 X2		24000 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9800 GX2		19200 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 4800 (25%)

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.

One or more cards in this comparison are multi-core. This means that their bandwidth, texel and pixel rates are theoretically doubled - this does not mean the card will actually perform twice as fast, but only that it should in theory be able to. Actual game benchmarks will give a more accurate idea of what it's capable of.

Price Comparison

Specifications

Memory Bandwidth: Bandwidth is the max amount of information (counted in MB per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface within a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the card's interface width by the speed of its memory. If the card has DDR type memory, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, the faster 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 processed in one second. This number is calculated by multiplying the total texture units by the core speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, 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 the video card could possibly write to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the number of colour ROPs by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel fill rate also depends on lots of other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the maximum fill rate.