GeForce GT 430 1GB vs Radeon HD 4850 X2 512MB

Intro

Compare all that to the Radeon HD 4850 X2 512MB, which has GPU core speed of 625 MHz, and 512 MB of GDDR3 memory set to run at 993 MHz through a 256-bit bus. It also is made up of 800(160x5) SPUs, 40 Texture Address Units, and 16 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GT 430 1GB		60 Watts
Radeon HD 4850 X2 512MB		250 Watts
	Difference: 190 Watts (317%)

Memory Bandwidth

Performance-wise, the Radeon HD 4850 X2 512MB should theoretically be a lot better than the GeForce GT 430 1GB overall. (explain)

Radeon HD 4850 X2 512MB		127104 MB/sec
GeForce GT 430 1GB		28800 MB/sec
	Difference: 98304 (341%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 4850 X2 512MB will be a lot (approximately 346%) faster with regards to texture filtering than the GeForce GT 430 1GB. (explain)

Radeon HD 4850 X2 512MB		50000 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GT 430 1GB		11200 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 38800 (346%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon HD 4850 X2 512MB will be quite a bit (about 614%) faster with regards to full screen anti-aliasing than the GeForce GT 430 1GB, and also should be able to handle higher screen resolutions without slowing down too much. (explain)

Radeon HD 4850 X2 512MB		20000 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GT 430 1GB		2800 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 17200 (614%)

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 max amount of data (in units of MB per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface in one second. The number is calculated by multiplying the interface width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that are processed per second. This number is calculated by multiplying the total number of texture units of the card by the core clock speed of the chip. The better this number, the better the card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the video card could possibly write to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the number of ROPs by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka 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, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the max fill rate.