GeForce RTX 3080 12 GB vs Radeon HD 6870

Intro

Compare that to the Radeon HD 6870, which has a clock speed of 900 MHz and a GDDR5 memory frequency of 1050 MHz. It also uses a 256-bit memory bus, and makes use of a 40 nm design. It is comprised of 1120 SPUs, 56 Texture Address Units, and 32 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 6870		151 Watts
GeForce RTX 3080 12 GB		350 Watts
	Difference: 199 Watts (132%)

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the GeForce RTX 3080 12 GB should in theory be quite a bit better than the Radeon HD 6870 in general. (explain)

GeForce RTX 3080 12 GB		934298 MB/sec
Radeon HD 6870		134400 MB/sec
	Difference: 799898 (595%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce RTX 3080 12 GB should be a lot (about 600%) faster with regards to texture filtering than the Radeon HD 6870. (explain)

GeForce RTX 3080 12 GB		352800 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 6870		50400 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 302400 (600%)

Pixel Rate

If running with a high screen resolution is important to you, then the GeForce RTX 3080 12 GB is a better choice, by a large margin. (explain)

GeForce RTX 3080 12 GB		141120 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 6870		28800 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 112320 (390%)

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 (in units of MB per second) that can be transported across the external memory interface in one second. It's calculated by multiplying the interface width by its memory speed. In the case of DDR type RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the bandwidth is, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that are processed in one second. This number is worked out by multiplying the total amount of texture units by the core clock speed of the chip. The better this number, the better the video card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the video card can possibly write to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the amount of ROPs by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel output rate is also dependant on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.