Radeon HD 5870 vs Radeon HD 6950 2GB

Intro

Compare those specifications to the Radeon HD 6950 2GB, which features GPU clock speed of 800 MHz, and 2048 MB of GDDR5 RAM running at 1250 MHz through a 256-bit bus. It also is comprised of 1408 SPUs, 88 TAUs, and 32 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 5870		188 Watts
Radeon HD 6950 2GB		200 Watts
	Difference: 12 Watts (6%)

Memory Bandwidth

The Radeon HD 6950 2GB, in theory, should be a bit faster than the Radeon HD 5870 in general. (explain)

Radeon HD 6950 2GB		160000 MB/sec
Radeon HD 5870		153600 MB/sec
	Difference: 6400 (4%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 6950 2GB is a bit (more or less 4%) better at AF than the Radeon HD 5870. (explain)

Radeon HD 6950 2GB		70400 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 5870		68000 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 2400 (4%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon HD 5870 will be just a bit (approximately 6%) faster with regards to AA than the Radeon HD 6950 2GB, and also will be capable of handling higher resolutions more effectively. (explain)

Radeon HD 5870		27200 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 6950 2GB		25600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 1600 (6%)

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 maximum amount of information (in units of MB per second) that can be moved across the external memory interface in one second. It's worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory speed. If it uses DDR type memory, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the bandwidth is, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that are processed per second. This figure is calculated by multiplying the total amount of texture units by the core speed of the chip. The higher this number, the better the video 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 that the graphics chip can possibly write to its local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel rate is also dependant on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the max fill rate.