Radeon HD 7970 vs Radeon R9 390X 8G

Intro

Compare those specifications to the Radeon R9 390X 8G, which uses a 28 nm design. AMD has set the core speed at 1050 MHz. The GDDR5 RAM is set to run at a frequency of 1500 MHz on this specific model. It features 2816 SPUs along with 176 TAUs and 64 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

Radeon R9 390X 8G		13555 points
Radeon HD 7970		8225 points
	Difference: 5330 (65%)

Ethereum Mining Hash Rate

Radeon R9 390X 8G		32 Mh/s
Radeon HD 7970		21 Mh/s
	Difference: 11 (52%)

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 7970		250 Watts
Radeon R9 390X 8G		275 Watts
	Difference: 25 Watts (10%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the Radeon R9 390X 8G should be quite a bit faster than the Radeon HD 7970 in general. (explain)

Radeon R9 390X 8G		384000 MB/sec
Radeon HD 7970		264000 MB/sec
	Difference: 120000 (45%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon R9 390X 8G should be quite a bit (more or less 56%) more effective at texture filtering than the Radeon HD 7970. (explain)

Radeon R9 390X 8G		184800 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 7970		118400 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 66400 (56%)

Pixel Rate

If running with a high screen resolution is important to you, then the Radeon R9 390X 8G is a better choice, by far. (explain)

Radeon R9 390X 8G		67200 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 7970		29600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 37600 (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: Bandwidth is the maximum amount of data (counted in megabytes per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface in one second. The number is calculated by multiplying the interface width by its memory speed. If the card has DDR type RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the bandwidth is, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels that the graphics card could possibly record to the local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is worked out 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 fill rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the max fill rate.