GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3 vs Radeon HD 5570

Intro

Compare all of that to the Radeon HD 5570, which uses a 40 nm design. AMD has set the core speed at 650 MHz. The DDR3 RAM is set to run at a speed of 900 MHz on this card. It features 400(80x5) SPUs as well as 20 TAUs and 8 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 5570		43 Watts
GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3		50 Watts
	Difference: 7 Watts (16%)

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the Radeon HD 5570 should in theory be a little bit better than the GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3 in general. (explain)

Radeon HD 5570		28800 MB/sec
GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3		25600 MB/sec
	Difference: 3200 (13%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 5570 will be quite a bit (about 48%) better at texture filtering than the GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3. (explain)

Radeon HD 5570		13000 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3		8800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 4200 (48%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon HD 5570 is a little bit (more or less 18%) faster with regards to full screen anti-aliasing than the GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3, and should be capable of handling higher resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

Radeon HD 5570		5200 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3		4400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 800 (18%)

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 largest amount of data (in units of megabytes per second) that can be transferred past the external memory interface within a second. It's calculated by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory speed. If it uses DDR type RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the card's 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 can be applied in one second. This number is calculated by multiplying the total number of texture units of the card by the core clock speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, the better the graphics 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 chip could possibly write to its local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the amount of Raster Operations Pipelines by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel fill rate is also dependant on lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.