Compare any two graphics cards:
VS

GeForce 9800 GX2 vs Radeon HD 6970

Intro

The GeForce 9800 GX2 uses a 65 nm design. nVidia has set the core frequency at 600 MHz. The GDDR3 RAM runs at a frequency of 1000 MHz on this particular model. It features 128 SPUs as well as 64 TAUs and 16 Rasterization Operator Units.

Compare all that to the Radeon HD 6970, which comes with GPU clock speed of 880 MHz, and 2048 MB of GDDR5 memory set to run at 1375 MHz through a 256-bit bus. It also is made up of 1536 SPUs, 96 TAUs, and 32 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9800 GX2 197 Watts
Radeon HD 6970 250 Watts
Difference: 53 Watts (27%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the Radeon HD 6970 should be much faster than the GeForce 9800 GX2 overall. (explain)

Radeon HD 6970 176000 MB/sec
GeForce 9800 GX2 128000 MB/sec
Difference: 48000 (38%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 6970 should be a bit (about 10%) better at texture filtering than the GeForce 9800 GX2. (explain)

Radeon HD 6970 84480 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9800 GX2 76800 Mtexels/sec
Difference: 7680 (10%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon HD 6970 will be a lot (approximately 47%) better at full screen anti-aliasing than the GeForce 9800 GX2, and also should be able to handle higher screen resolutions better. (explain)

Radeon HD 6970 28160 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9800 GX2 19200 Mpixels/sec
Difference: 8960 (47%)

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

Display Prices

Hide Prices

GeForce 9800 GX2

Amazon.com

Check prices at:

Radeon HD 6970

Amazon.com

Check prices at:

Please note that the price comparisons are based on search keywords - sometimes it might show cards with very similar names that are not exactly the same as the one chosen in the comparison. We do try to filter out the wrong results as best we can, though.

Specifications

Display Specifications

Hide Specifications

Model GeForce 9800 GX2 Radeon HD 6970
Manufacturer nVidia AMD
Year Mar 2008 December 2010
Code Name G92 Cayman XT
Memory 512 MB (x2) 2048 MB
Core Speed 600 MHz (x2) 880 MHz
Memory Speed 2000 MHz (x2) 5500 MHz
Power (Max TDP) 197 watts 250 watts
Bandwidth 128000 MB/sec 176000 MB/sec
Texel Rate 76800 Mtexels/sec 84480 Mtexels/sec
Pixel Rate 19200 Mpixels/sec 28160 Mpixels/sec
Unified Shaders 128 (x2) 1536
Texture Mapping Units 64 (x2) 96
Render Output Units 16 (x2) 32
Bus Type GDDR3 GDDR5
Bus Width 256-bit (x2) 256-bit
Fab Process 65 nm 40 nm
Transistors 754 million 2640 million
Bus PCIe x16 2.0 PCIe x16
DirectX Version DirectX 10 DirectX 11
OpenGL Version OpenGL 3.0 OpenGL 4.1

Memory Bandwidth: Bandwidth is the maximum amount of data (in units of MB per second) that can be moved across the external memory interface in one second. The number is calculated by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory speed. If the card has DDR type memory, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and higher screen 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 texture units by the core speed of the chip. The higher this number, the better the video card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels processed per second.

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

Display Prices

Hide Prices

GeForce 9800 GX2

Amazon.com

Check prices at:

Radeon HD 6970

Amazon.com

Check prices at:

Please note that the price comparisons are based on search keywords - sometimes it might show cards with very similar names that are not exactly the same as the one chosen in the comparison. We do try to filter out the wrong results as best we can, though.

Comments

Be the first to leave a comment!

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *


*

WordPress Anti Spam by WP-SpamShield