GeForce GT 340 1GB vs Radeon HD 3850 256MB

Intro

Compare that to the Radeon HD 3850 256MB, which comes with core clock speeds of 668 MHz on the GPU, and 828 MHz on the 256 MB of GDDR3 memory. It features 320(64x5) SPUs as well as 16 TAUs and 16 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GT 340 1GB		69 Watts
Radeon HD 3850 256MB		75 Watts
	Difference: 6 Watts (9%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce GT 340 1GB should be 3% faster than the Radeon HD 3850 256MB in general, because of its higher data rate. (explain)

GeForce GT 340 1GB		54400 MB/sec
Radeon HD 3850 256MB		52992 MB/sec
	Difference: 1408 (3%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GT 340 1GB is quite a bit (approximately 65%) more effective at texture filtering than the Radeon HD 3850 256MB. (explain)

GeForce GT 340 1GB		17600 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 3850 256MB		10688 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 6912 (65%)

Pixel Rate

If running with lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the Radeon HD 3850 256MB is a better choice, by a large margin. (explain)

Radeon HD 3850 256MB		10688 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GT 340 1GB		4400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 6288 (143%)

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 (measured in megabytes per second) that can be moved across the external memory interface in a second. The number is worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory clock speed. If the card has DDR type RAM, the result 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 anti-aliasing, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that are applied per second. This is worked out by multiplying the total number of texture units by the core 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 processed per second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels that the graphics card could possibly write to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel output rate is also dependant on lots of other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.