GeForce 9800 GT 1GB vs Radeon HD 6950

Intro

Compare those specs to the Radeon HD 6950, which features a clock frequency of 800 MHz and a GDDR5 memory speed of 1250 MHz. It also features a 256-bit memory bus, and uses a 40 nm design. It is made up of 1408 SPUs, 88 TAUs, and 32 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9800 GT 1GB		105 Watts
Radeon HD 6950		200 Watts
	Difference: 95 Watts (90%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically, the Radeon HD 6950 should be a lot faster than the GeForce 9800 GT 1GB in general. (explain)

Radeon HD 6950		160000 MB/sec
GeForce 9800 GT 1GB		57600 MB/sec
	Difference: 102400 (178%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 6950 is a lot (approximately 110%) more effective at AF than the GeForce 9800 GT 1GB. (explain)

Radeon HD 6950		70400 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9800 GT 1GB		33600 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 36800 (110%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon HD 6950 should be quite a bit (more or less 167%) faster with regards to AA than the GeForce 9800 GT 1GB, and able to handle higher screen resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

Radeon HD 6950		25600 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9800 GT 1GB		9600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 16000 (167%)

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 max amount of data (counted in megabytes per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface in one second. The number is calculated by multiplying the interface width by the speed of its memory. If it uses DDR memory, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the bandwidth is, the better 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 can be applied in one second. This number is calculated by multiplying the total texture units of the card by the core clock speed of the chip. The higher the texel rate, the better the card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels the graphics card can possibly write to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is worked out by multiplying the number of Raster Operations Pipelines by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel rate also depends on quite a few other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the max fill rate.