Radeon HD 5670 vs Radeon HD 5970

Intro

Compare all that to the Radeon HD 5970, which comes with core speeds of 725 MHz on the GPU, and 1000 MHz on the 1024 MB of GDDR5 RAM. It features 1600 SPUs as well as 160 TAUs and 64 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 5670		61 Watts
Radeon HD 5970		294 Watts
	Difference: 233 Watts (382%)

Memory Bandwidth

The Radeon HD 5970 should theoretically perform quite a bit faster than the Radeon HD 5670 in general. (explain)

Radeon HD 5970		256000 MB/sec
Radeon HD 5670		64000 MB/sec
	Difference: 192000 (300%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 5970 should be quite a bit (approximately 1397%) better at AF than the Radeon HD 5670. (explain)

Radeon HD 5970		232000 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 5670		15500 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 216500 (1397%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon HD 5970 is quite a bit (approximately 1397%) faster with regards to AA than the Radeon HD 5670, and will be able to handle higher screen resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

Radeon HD 5970		92800 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 5670		6200 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 86600 (1397%)

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.

One or more cards in this comparison are multi-core. This means that their bandwidth, texel and pixel rates are theoretically doubled - this does not mean the card will actually perform twice as fast, but only that it should in theory be able to. Actual game benchmarks will give a more accurate idea of what it's capable of.

Price Comparison

Specifications

Memory Bandwidth: Bandwidth is the maximum amount of data (measured in MB per second) that can be transported across the external memory interface in one second. The number is worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory speed. If it uses DDR type RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 once again. If 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 number of texture map elements (texels) that are applied in one second. This number is calculated by multiplying the total amount of texture units by the core speed of the chip. The higher the texel rate, the better the video card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels processed in a second.

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