GeForce GTX 980 vs Radeon HD 7950

Intro

Compare that to the Radeon HD 7950, which makes use of a 28 nm design. AMD has set the core speed at 800 MHz. The GDDR5 memory runs at a speed of 1250 MHz on this particular model. It features 1792 SPUs as well as 112 TAUs and 32 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Benchmarks

These are real-world performance benchmarks that were submitted by Hardware Compare users. The scores seen here are the average of all benchmarks submitted for each respective test and hardware.

3DMark Fire Strike Graphics Score

GeForce GTX 980		13552 points
Radeon HD 7950		7731 points
	Difference: 5821 (75%)

Ethereum Mining Hash Rate

Radeon HD 7950		21 Mh/s
GeForce GTX 980		20 Mh/s
	Difference: 1 (5%)

Zcash Mining Hash Rate

GeForce GTX 980		408 Sol/s
Radeon HD 7950		235 Sol/s
	Difference: 173 (74%)

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 980		165 Watts
Radeon HD 7950		200 Watts
	Difference: 35 Watts (21%)

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the Radeon HD 7950 should theoretically be a small bit better than the GeForce GTX 980 overall. (explain)

Radeon HD 7950		240000 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 980		224000 MB/sec
	Difference: 16000 (7%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 980 should be a lot (about 61%) better at AF than the Radeon HD 7950. (explain)

GeForce GTX 980		144128 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 7950		89600 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 54528 (61%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 980 will be quite a bit (more or less 182%) better at anti-aliasing than the Radeon HD 7950, and will be able to handle higher screen resolutions more effectively. (explain)

GeForce GTX 980		72064 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 7950		25600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 46464 (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 maximum amount of data (in units of MB per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface in one second. It's worked out by multiplying the interface width by its memory speed. If it uses DDR type RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the bandwidth is, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that can be applied in one second. This number is worked out by multiplying the total texture units 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 in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the graphics card could possibly write to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the number of Raster Operations Pipelines by the the core clock speed. 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 also depends on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the maximum fill rate.