Radeon HD 3470 512MB vs Radeon R9 M385X

Intro

Compare those specs to the Radeon R9 M385X, which has a core clock speed of 1100 MHz and a GDDR5 memory frequency of 1500 MHz. It also makes use of a 128-bit memory bus, and makes use of a 28 nm design. It is comprised of 896 SPUs, 56 TAUs, and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the Radeon R9 M385X should theoretically be quite a bit superior to the Radeon HD 3470 512MB overall. (explain)

Radeon R9 M385X		96000 MB/sec
Radeon HD 3470 512MB		30400 MB/sec
	Difference: 65600 (216%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon R9 M385X will be quite a bit (more or less 1825%) more effective at texture filtering than the Radeon HD 3470 512MB. (explain)

Radeon R9 M385X		61600 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 3470 512MB		3200 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 58400 (1825%)

Pixel Rate

If running with high levels of AA is important to you, then the Radeon R9 M385X is a better choice, and very much so. (explain)

Radeon R9 M385X		17600 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 3470 512MB		3200 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 14400 (450%)

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 MB per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface in one second. It's worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR type RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the bandwidth is, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the graphics card could possibly record to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the number of colour ROPs by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel rate is also dependant on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the max fill rate.