GeForce GTX 285 2GB vs Radeon R9 280X

Intro

Compare that to the Radeon R9 280X, which makes use of a 28 nm design. AMD has clocked the core frequency at 850 MHz. The GDDR5 RAM is set to run at a speed of 1500 MHz on this specific model. It features 2048 SPUs as well as 128 TAUs and 32 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 285 2GB		204 Watts
Radeon R9 280X		250 Watts
	Difference: 46 Watts (23%)

Memory Bandwidth

The Radeon R9 280X should theoretically perform quite a bit faster than the GeForce GTX 285 2GB overall. (explain)

Radeon R9 280X		288000 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 285 2GB		158976 MB/sec
	Difference: 129024 (81%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon R9 280X is much (approximately 110%) better at texture filtering than the GeForce GTX 285 2GB. (explain)

Radeon R9 280X		108800 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 285 2GB		51840 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 56960 (110%)

Pixel Rate

If using a high screen resolution is important to you, then the Radeon R9 280X is a better choice, by far. (explain)

Radeon R9 280X		27200 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 285 2GB		20736 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 6464 (31%)

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 max amount of information (measured in megabytes per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface within a second. It is calculated by multiplying the card's bus width by the speed of its memory. If the card has DDR RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels that the graphics chip can possibly record to its local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number 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 drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel rate also depends on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the max fill rate.