Radeon HD 4870 512MB vs Radeon RX 550

Intro

Compare those specifications to the Radeon RX 550, which features GPU core speed of 1100 MHz, and 2048 MB of GDDR5 memory set to run at 1750 MHz through a 128-bit bus. It also features 512 SPUs, 32 Texture Address Units, and 16 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon RX 550		50 Watts
Radeon HD 4870 512MB		150 Watts
	Difference: 100 Watts (200%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the Radeon HD 4870 512MB should be 0% quicker than the Radeon RX 550 in general, because of its greater bandwidth. (explain)

Radeon HD 4870 512MB		115200 MB/sec
Radeon RX 550		114688 MB/sec
	Difference: 512 (0%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon RX 550 should be just a bit (approximately 17%) faster with regards to AF than the Radeon HD 4870 512MB. (explain)

Radeon RX 550		35200 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 4870 512MB		30000 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 5200 (17%)

Pixel Rate

If using lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the Radeon RX 550 is the winner, and very much so. (explain)

Radeon RX 550		17600 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4870 512MB		12000 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 5600 (47%)

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 maximum amount of information (in units of MB per second) that can be transported past the external memory interface in a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory speed. In the case of DDR type memory, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the video card can possibly record to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the amount of Raster Operations Pipelines by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel rate also depends on quite a few other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the max fill rate.