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GeForce GTX 960M vs Radeon HD 3870 512MB

Intro

The GeForce GTX 960M comes with core clock speeds of 1096 MHz on the GPU, and 1000 MHz on the 2048 MB of GDDR5 memory. It features 640 SPUs as well as 40 TAUs and 16 Rasterization Operator Units.

Compare all that to the Radeon HD 3870 512MB, which has a core clock frequency of 775 MHz and a GDDR3 memory speed of 900 MHz. It also uses a 256-bit bus, and makes use of a 55 nm design. It features 320(64x5) SPUs, 16 Texture Address Units, and 16 Raster Operation Units.

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 960M 65 Watts
Radeon HD 3870 512MB 106 Watts
Difference: 41 Watts (63%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce GTX 960M should be just a bit faster than the Radeon HD 3870 512MB overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 960M 64000 MB/sec
Radeon HD 3870 512MB 57600 MB/sec
Difference: 6400 (11%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 960M should be much (more or less 254%) more effective at anisotropic filtering than the Radeon HD 3870 512MB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 960M 43840 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 3870 512MB 12400 Mtexels/sec
Difference: 31440 (254%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 960M is much (more or less 41%) better at full screen anti-aliasing than the Radeon HD 3870 512MB, and also able to handle higher screen resolutions more effectively. (explain)

GeForce GTX 960M 17536 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 3870 512MB 12400 Mpixels/sec
Difference: 5136 (41%)

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

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GeForce GTX 960M

Amazon.com

Check prices at:

Radeon HD 3870 512MB

Amazon.com

Check prices at:

Please note that the price comparisons are based on search keywords - sometimes it might show cards with very similar names that are not exactly the same as the one chosen in the comparison. We do try to filter out the wrong results as best we can, though.

Specifications

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Model GeForce GTX 960M Radeon HD 3870 512MB
Manufacturer nVidia AMD
Year March 12 2015 Nov 19, 2007
Code Name GM107 RV670 XT
Memory 2048 MB 512 MB
Core Speed 1096 MHz 775 MHz
Memory Speed 4000 MHz 1800 MHz
Power (Max TDP) 65 watts 106 watts
Bandwidth 64000 MB/sec 57600 MB/sec
Texel Rate 43840 Mtexels/sec 12400 Mtexels/sec
Pixel Rate 17536 Mpixels/sec 12400 Mpixels/sec
Unified Shaders 640 320(64x5)
Texture Mapping Units 40 16
Render Output Units 16 16
Bus Type GDDR5 GDDR3
Bus Width 128-bit 256-bit
Fab Process 28 nm 55 nm
Transistors (Unknown) million (Unknown) million
Bus PCIe 3.0 x16 PCIe 2.0 x16/AGP 8x
DirectX Version DirectX 12 DirectX 10.1
OpenGL Version OpenGL 4.5 OpenGL 3.0

Memory Bandwidth: Bandwidth is the max amount of information (counted in megabytes per second) that can be transported past the external memory interface in a second. It's calculated by multiplying the card's interface width by the speed of its memory. If it uses DDR memory, it must be multiplied by 2 once 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, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that are processed in one second. This number is worked out by multiplying the total amount of texture units of the card by the core clock speed of the chip. The higher the texel rate, the better the video 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 maximum amount of pixels that the graphics card can possibly record to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is worked out by multiplying the amount of Render Output Units by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel output rate also depends on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the maximum fill rate.

Display Prices

Hide Prices

GeForce GTX 960M

Amazon.com

Check prices at:

Radeon HD 3870 512MB

Amazon.com

Check prices at:

Please note that the price comparisons are based on search keywords - sometimes it might show cards with very similar names that are not exactly the same as the one chosen in the comparison. We do try to filter out the wrong results as best we can, though.

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