GeForce GTX 580 3GB vs Radeon HD 4890 1GB

Intro

Compare those specs to the Radeon HD 4890 1GB, which features a GPU core clock speed of 1000 MHz, and 1024 MB of GDDR5 memory running at 975 MHz through a 256-bit bus. It also is made up of 800(160x5) SPUs, 40 TAUs, and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 4890 1GB		190 Watts
GeForce GTX 580 3GB		244 Watts
	Difference: 54 Watts (28%)

Memory Bandwidth

Performance-wise, the GeForce GTX 580 3GB should theoretically be quite a bit better than the Radeon HD 4890 1GB overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		192384 MB/sec
Radeon HD 4890 1GB		124800 MB/sec
	Difference: 67584 (54%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 580 3GB should be quite a bit (more or less 24%) more effective at texture filtering than the Radeon HD 4890 1GB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		49408 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 4890 1GB		40000 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 9408 (24%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 580 3GB will be quite a bit (more or less 132%) better at FSAA than the Radeon HD 4890 1GB, and also should be capable of handling higher resolutions more effectively. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		37056 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4890 1GB		16000 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 21056 (132%)

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 (in units of MB per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface in a second. It's worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by the speed of its memory. If it uses DDR type memory, it must be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR 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 amount of texture units by the core speed of the chip. The better 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 in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels that the graphics chip can possibly write to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the number of colour ROPs by the the core 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 quite a few other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the maximum fill rate.