GeForce GT 440 1.5GB vs Radeon HD 4550 512MB

Intro

Compare those specifications to the Radeon HD 4550 512MB, which comes with a core clock speed of 600 MHz and a GDDR3 memory frequency of 800 MHz. It also makes use of a 64-bit memory bus, and uses a 55 nm design. It is made up of 80(16x5) SPUs, 8 TAUs, and 4 ROPs.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 4550 512MB		25 Watts
GeForce GT 440 1.5GB		56 Watts
	Difference: 31 Watts (124%)

Memory Bandwidth

Performance-wise, the GeForce GT 440 1.5GB should in theory be a lot better than the Radeon HD 4550 512MB overall. (explain)

GeForce GT 440 1.5GB		43200 MB/sec
Radeon HD 4550 512MB		12800 MB/sec
	Difference: 30400 (238%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GT 440 1.5GB will be a lot (about 197%) better at AF than the Radeon HD 4550 512MB. (explain)

GeForce GT 440 1.5GB		14256 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 4550 512MB		4800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 9456 (197%)

Pixel Rate

If running with high levels of AA is important to you, then the GeForce GT 440 1.5GB is a better choice, by far. (explain)

GeForce GT 440 1.5GB		14256 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4550 512MB		2400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 11856 (494%)

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 maximum amount of data (in units of MB per second) that can be transferred past the external memory interface in a second. It's worked out by multiplying the bus width by its memory clock speed. In the case of DDR RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the bandwidth is, the better 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 amount of texture map elements (texels) that are processed per second. This is calculated by multiplying the total texture units by the core speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, the better the graphics card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels that the graphics card could possibly write to its local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the number of Render Output Units by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel fill rate also depends on lots of other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the max fill rate.