GeForce GT 230 vs Radeon HD 6850

Intro

Compare that to the Radeon HD 6850, which features a core clock speed of 775 MHz and a GDDR5 memory frequency of 1000 MHz. It also features a 256-bit memory bus, and makes use of a 40 nm design. It features 960 SPUs, 48 TAUs, and 32 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GT 230		65 Watts
Radeon HD 6850		127 Watts
	Difference: 62 Watts (95%)

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the Radeon HD 6850 should theoretically be quite a bit superior to the GeForce GT 230 overall. (explain)

Radeon HD 6850		128000 MB/sec
GeForce GT 230		38400 MB/sec
	Difference: 89600 (233%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 6850 will be a lot (approximately 323%) more effective at texture filtering than the GeForce GT 230. (explain)

Radeon HD 6850		37200 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GT 230		8800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 28400 (323%)

Pixel Rate

If using a high screen resolution is important to you, then the Radeon HD 6850 is superior to the GeForce GT 230, by far. (explain)

Radeon HD 6850		24800 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GT 230		4400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 20400 (464%)

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 max amount of information (counted in megabytes per second) that can be moved across the external memory interface in one second. It's worked out by multiplying the bus width by its memory clock speed. In the case of DDR type RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the bandwidth is, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that can be processed in one second. This is worked out 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 applied in a second.

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