GeForce GTX 460 SE vs Radeon HD 3870 512MB

Intro

Compare those specs to the Radeon HD 3870 512MB, which makes use of a 55 nm design. AMD has clocked the core frequency at 775 MHz. The GDDR3 memory runs at a speed of 900 MHz on this specific model. It features 320(64x5) SPUs along with 16 Texture Address Units and 16 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 3870 512MB		106 Watts
GeForce GTX 460 SE		150 Watts
	Difference: 44 Watts (42%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the GeForce GTX 460 SE should be quite a bit faster than the Radeon HD 3870 512MB in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 SE		108800 MB/sec
Radeon HD 3870 512MB		57600 MB/sec
	Difference: 51200 (89%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 460 SE should be quite a bit (about 152%) faster with regards to AF than the Radeon HD 3870 512MB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 SE		31200 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 3870 512MB		12400 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 18800 (152%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 460 SE is quite a bit (about 68%) better at anti-aliasing than the Radeon HD 3870 512MB, and also should be capable of handling higher screen resolutions more effectively. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 SE		20800 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 3870 512MB		12400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 8400 (68%)

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 (in units of MB per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface within a second. The number is worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the bandwidth is, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels that the graphics chip can possibly record to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel fill rate also depends on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the maximum fill rate.