GeForce GT 210 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 uses a 64-bit bus, and makes use of a 55 nm design. It is made up of 80(16x5) SPUs, 8 Texture Address Units, and 4 ROPs.

Fallout 3

Settings:	High Settings
AA:	none
AF:	none
Resolution:	1280x1024
Test Machine:	Intel Core i7-920,3 x 1 GB Ram,Windows Vista Ultimate 64 Bit SP1 (Source)

Radeon HD 4550 512MB		26 FPS
GeForce GT 210		20 FPS
	Difference: 6 FPS (30%)

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 4550 512MB		25 Watts
GeForce GT 210		31 Watts
	Difference: 6 Watts (24%)

Memory Bandwidth

Both cards have exactly the same bandwidth, so in theory they should have the same performance. (explain)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 4550 512MB should be just a bit (about 2%) better at texture filtering than the GeForce GT 210. (explain)

Radeon HD 4550 512MB		4800 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GT 210		4712 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 88 (2%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon HD 4550 512MB will be just a bit (more or less 2%) faster with regards to AA than the GeForce GT 210, and also will be capable of handling higher screen resolutions better. (explain)

Radeon HD 4550 512MB		2400 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GT 210		2356 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 44 (2%)

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 largest amount of information (measured in MB per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface within a second. It's worked out by multiplying the bus width by its memory speed. If it uses DDR type RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the bandwidth is, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels that the graphics card could possibly record to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the number of ROPs by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel rate is also dependant on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the max fill rate.