GeForce GTX 950 vs Radeon HD 4870 512MB

Intro

Compare those specs to the Radeon HD 4870 512MB, which features core speeds of 750 MHz on the GPU, and 900 MHz on the 512 MB of GDDR5 memory. It features 800(160x5) SPUs along with 40 TAUs and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 950		90 Watts
Radeon HD 4870 512MB		150 Watts
	Difference: 60 Watts (67%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the Radeon HD 4870 512MB should be 9% faster than the GeForce GTX 950 overall, due to its greater bandwidth. (explain)

Radeon HD 4870 512MB		115200 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 950		105728 MB/sec
	Difference: 9472 (9%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 950 should be much (about 64%) better at texture filtering than the Radeon HD 4870 512MB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 950		49152 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 4870 512MB		30000 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 19152 (64%)

Pixel Rate

If using high levels of AA is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 950 is superior to the Radeon HD 4870 512MB, by a large margin. (explain)

GeForce GTX 950		32768 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4870 512MB		12000 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 20768 (173%)

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 largest amount of data (measured in MB per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface in one second. It is worked out by multiplying the interface width by its memory speed. In the case of DDR memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the memory bandwidth, 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 number of texture map elements (texels) that can be processed in one second. This number is worked out by multiplying the total texture units by the core clock speed of the chip. The better this number, the better the graphics card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels applied in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the graphics card could possibly record to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the amount of ROPs by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel output rate also depends on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.