GeForce GTX 580 3GB vs Radeon HD 5830

Intro

Compare that to the Radeon HD 5830, which features a clock speed of 800 MHz and a GDDR5 memory speed of 1000 MHz. It also features a 256-bit bus, and makes use of a 40 nm design. It features 1120(224x5) SPUs, 56 Texture Address Units, and 16 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 5830		175 Watts
GeForce GTX 580 3GB		244 Watts
	Difference: 69 Watts (39%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the GeForce GTX 580 3GB should be much faster than the Radeon HD 5830 in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		192384 MB/sec
Radeon HD 5830		128000 MB/sec
	Difference: 64384 (50%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 580 3GB will be just a bit (approximately 10%) more effective at texture filtering than the Radeon HD 5830. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		49408 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 5830		44800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 4608 (10%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 580 3GB should be a lot (more or less 190%) better at FSAA than the Radeon HD 5830, and should be capable of handling higher resolutions without slowing down too much. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		37056 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 5830		12800 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 24256 (190%)

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 megabytes per second) that can be moved across the external memory interface in one second. It is worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory speed. If it uses DDR type RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels the graphics card could possibly record to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the number of ROPs by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the maximum fill rate.