GeForce GTX 480 vs Radeon HD 3870 512MB

Intro

Compare that to the Radeon HD 3870 512MB, which features a clock frequency of 775 MHz and a GDDR3 memory frequency of 900 MHz. It also features a 256-bit bus, and makes use of a 55 nm design. It is made up of 320(64x5) SPUs, 16 TAUs, and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 3870 512MB		106 Watts
GeForce GTX 480		250 Watts
	Difference: 144 Watts (136%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GTX 480, in theory, should perform quite a bit faster than the Radeon HD 3870 512MB overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 480		177408 MB/sec
Radeon HD 3870 512MB		57600 MB/sec
	Difference: 119808 (208%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 480 will be a lot (about 239%) faster with regards to texture filtering than the Radeon HD 3870 512MB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 480		42000 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 3870 512MB		12400 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 29600 (239%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 480 will be quite a bit (about 171%) more effective at FSAA than the Radeon HD 3870 512MB, and able to handle higher screen resolutions more effectively. (explain)

GeForce GTX 480		33600 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 3870 512MB		12400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 21200 (171%)

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 information (measured in MB per second) that can be transferred across the external memory interface within a second. The number is worked out by multiplying the bus width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR memory, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the bandwidth is, 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 figure is worked out by multiplying the total texture units of the card by the core clock speed of the chip. The higher this number, the better the video card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels per second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels that the graphics card could possibly record to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the number of Raster Operations Pipelines by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel fill rate also depends on lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the maximum fill rate.