GeForce GT 340 1GB vs Radeon HD 3850 X2

Intro

Compare all of that to the Radeon HD 3850 X2, which features a clock frequency of 668 MHz and a GDDR3 memory speed of 828 MHz. It also features a 256-bit memory bus, and makes use of a 55 nm design. It is comprised of 320(64x5) SPUs, 16 TAUs, and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the Radeon HD 3850 X2 should be quite a bit faster than the GeForce GT 340 1GB in general. (explain)

Radeon HD 3850 X2		105984 MB/sec
GeForce GT 340 1GB		54400 MB/sec
	Difference: 51584 (95%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 3850 X2 will be quite a bit (approximately 21%) better at texture filtering than the GeForce GT 340 1GB. (explain)

Radeon HD 3850 X2		21376 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GT 340 1GB		17600 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 3776 (21%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon HD 3850 X2 is a lot (approximately 386%) better at AA than the GeForce GT 340 1GB, and will be able to handle higher screen resolutions better. (explain)

Radeon HD 3850 X2		21376 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GT 340 1GB		4400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 16976 (386%)

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

Specifications

Memory Bandwidth: Memory bandwidth is the maximum amount of information (in units of megabytes per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface in one second. The number is calculated by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the memory bandwidth, 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 number of texture map elements (texels) that can be processed per second. This is calculated by multiplying the total number of texture units by the core clock speed of the chip. The better this number, the better the graphics card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels applied in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the video card can possibly write to its local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the amount of 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 fill rate also depends on lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.