GeForce GT 420 vs Radeon HD 4550 256MB

Intro

Compare all that to the Radeon HD 4550 256MB, which comes with a GPU core clock speed of 600 MHz, and 256 MB of DDR3 RAM running at 800 MHz through a 64-bit bus. It also is made up of 80(16x5) SPUs, 8 TAUs, and 4 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 4550 256MB		25 Watts
GeForce GT 420		50 Watts
	Difference: 25 Watts (100%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GT 420 should theoretically perform a lot faster than the Radeon HD 4550 256MB in general. (explain)

GeForce GT 420		28800 MB/sec
Radeon HD 4550 256MB		12800 MB/sec
	Difference: 16000 (125%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GT 420 will be just a bit (about 17%) better at texture filtering than the Radeon HD 4550 256MB. (explain)

GeForce GT 420		5600 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 4550 256MB		4800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 800 (17%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GT 420 should be just a bit (approximately 17%) more effective at anti-aliasing than the Radeon HD 4550 256MB, and also should be capable of handling higher resolutions more effectively. (explain)

GeForce GT 420		2800 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4550 256MB		2400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 400 (17%)

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: Bandwidth is the max amount of data (measured in megabytes per second) that can be transported over the external memory interface within a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the interface width by its memory speed. In the case of DDR type RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the bandwidth is, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum amount of texture map elements (texels) that are processed per second. This figure is calculated by multiplying the total number of texture units of the card 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 in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the video card could possibly record to the local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the amount 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 outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel output rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the max fill rate.