Radeon HD 4870 512MB vs Radeon HD 5870

Intro

Compare that to the Radeon HD 5870, which makes use of a 40 nm design. AMD has set the core frequency at 850 MHz. The GDDR5 memory is set to run at a speed of 1200 MHz on this specific card. It features 1600(320x5) SPUs along with 80 TAUs and 32 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 4870 512MB		150 Watts
Radeon HD 5870		188 Watts
	Difference: 38 Watts (25%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically, the Radeon HD 5870 should be a lot faster than the Radeon HD 4870 512MB in general. (explain)

Radeon HD 5870		153600 MB/sec
Radeon HD 4870 512MB		115200 MB/sec
	Difference: 38400 (33%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 5870 should be quite a bit (about 127%) more effective at AF than the Radeon HD 4870 512MB. (explain)

Radeon HD 5870		68000 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 4870 512MB		30000 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 38000 (127%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon HD 5870 will be much (more or less 127%) faster with regards to FSAA than the Radeon HD 4870 512MB, and also able to handle higher screen resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

Radeon HD 5870		27200 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4870 512MB		12000 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 15200 (127%)

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 data (in units of megabytes per second) that can be moved across the external memory interface within a second. It's worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory clock speed. In the case of DDR type RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 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 can be processed per second. This number is calculated by multiplying the total texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, the better the video card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels applied in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the graphics card could possibly record to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the number of ROPs by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel output rate also depends on lots of other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the max fill rate.