GeForce GT 430 vs Radeon HD 3470 512MB

Intro

Compare those specs to the Radeon HD 3470 512MB, which comes with GPU core speed of 800 MHz, and 512 MB of GDDR3 memory running at 950 MHz through a 128-bit bus. It also is comprised of 40(8x5) SPUs, 4 TAUs, and 4 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the Radeon HD 3470 512MB will be 6% faster than the GeForce GT 430 in general, because of its greater data rate. (explain)

Radeon HD 3470 512MB		30400 MB/sec
GeForce GT 430		28800 MB/sec
	Difference: 1600 (6%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GT 430 will be much (more or less 250%) better at anisotropic filtering than the Radeon HD 3470 512MB. (explain)

GeForce GT 430		11200 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 3470 512MB		3200 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 8000 (250%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon HD 3470 512MB should be a small bit (more or less 14%) faster with regards to anti-aliasing than the GeForce GT 430, and also capable of handling higher screen resolutions better. (explain)

Radeon HD 3470 512MB		3200 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GT 430		2800 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 400 (14%)

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 data (counted in MB per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface in a second. The number is worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by the speed of its memory. If it uses DDR memory, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the faster 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 amount of texture map elements (texels) that can be processed per second. This figure is worked out by multiplying the total amount of texture units of the card by the core clock speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, the better the 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 amount of pixels that the graphics chip can possibly write to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the amount of Render Output Units by the the card's clock speed. 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 rate also depends on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the max fill rate.