GeForce GT 240 GDDR5 vs Radeon HD 3870 512MB

Intro

Compare that to the Radeon HD 3870 512MB, which comes with a GPU core clock speed of 775 MHz, and 512 MB of GDDR3 RAM set to run at 900 MHz through a 256-bit bus. It also features 320(64x5) Stream Processors, 16 TAUs, and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GT 240 GDDR5		70 Watts
Radeon HD 3870 512MB		106 Watts
	Difference: 36 Watts (51%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the Radeon HD 3870 512MB is 6% quicker than the GeForce GT 240 GDDR5 in general, because of its greater bandwidth. (explain)

Radeon HD 3870 512MB		57600 MB/sec
GeForce GT 240 GDDR5		54400 MB/sec
	Difference: 3200 (6%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GT 240 GDDR5 should be a lot (about 42%) better at AF than the Radeon HD 3870 512MB. (explain)

GeForce GT 240 GDDR5		17600 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 3870 512MB		12400 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 5200 (42%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon HD 3870 512MB should be quite a bit (about 182%) more effective at full screen anti-aliasing than the GeForce GT 240 GDDR5, and should be able to handle higher resolutions better. (explain)

Radeon HD 3870 512MB		12400 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GT 240 GDDR5		4400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 8000 (182%)

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 data (measured in megabytes per second) that can be moved over the external memory interface in one second. It's worked out by multiplying the bus width by its memory speed. If it uses DDR RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels that the graphics chip can possibly write to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the number of colour ROPs by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel output rate is also dependant on lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the max fill rate.