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GeForce 8800 GT 512MB vs Radeon HD 3850 256MB

Intro

The GeForce 8800 GT 512MB features a core clock speed of 600 MHz and a GDDR3 memory frequency of 900 MHz. It also makes use of a 256-bit bus, and makes use of a 65 nm design. It is comprised of 112 SPUs, 56 TAUs, and 16 ROPs.

Compare those specifications to the Radeon HD 3850 256MB, which comes with GPU core speed of 668 MHz, and 256 MB of GDDR3 RAM set to run at 828 MHz through a 256-bit bus. It also is made up of 320(64x5) Stream Processors, 16 Texture Address Units, and 16 ROPs.

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 3850 256MB 75 Watts
GeForce 8800 GT 512MB 105 Watts
Difference: 30 Watts (40%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the GeForce 8800 GT 512MB is 9% faster than the Radeon HD 3850 256MB overall, because of its higher data rate. (explain)

GeForce 8800 GT 512MB 57600 MB/sec
Radeon HD 3850 256MB 52992 MB/sec
Difference: 4608 (9%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 8800 GT 512MB should be quite a bit (about 214%) more effective at texture filtering than the Radeon HD 3850 256MB. (explain)

GeForce 8800 GT 512MB 33600 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 3850 256MB 10688 Mtexels/sec
Difference: 22912 (214%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon HD 3850 256MB is a small bit (about 11%) faster with regards to FSAA than the GeForce 8800 GT 512MB, and also will be able to handle higher screen resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

Radeon HD 3850 256MB 10688 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8800 GT 512MB 9600 Mpixels/sec
Difference: 1088 (11%)

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 8800 GT 512MB

Amazon.com

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Radeon HD 3850 256MB

Amazon.com

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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 8800 GT 512MB Radeon HD 3850 256MB
Manufacturer nVidia AMD
Year Oct 2007 Nov 19, 2007
Code Name G92 RV670 PRO
Memory 512 MB 256 MB
Core Speed 600 MHz 668 MHz
Memory Speed 1800 MHz 1656 MHz
Power (Max TDP) 105 watts 75 watts
Bandwidth 57600 MB/sec 52992 MB/sec
Texel Rate 33600 Mtexels/sec 10688 Mtexels/sec
Pixel Rate 9600 Mpixels/sec 10688 Mpixels/sec
Unified Shaders 112 320(64x5)
Texture Mapping Units 56 16
Render Output Units 16 16
Bus Type GDDR3 GDDR3
Bus Width 256-bit 256-bit
Fab Process 65 nm 55 nm
Transistors 754 million (Unknown) million
Bus PCIe x16 2.0 PCIe 2.0 x16/AGP 8x
DirectX Version DirectX 10 DirectX 10.1
OpenGL Version OpenGL 3.0 OpenGL 3.0

Memory Bandwidth: Bandwidth is the max amount of data (measured in megabytes per second) that can be moved across the external memory interface within a second. It is calculated by multiplying the card's interface width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels the video card could possibly record to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the number of ROPs by the the core clock speed. 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 lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the max fill rate.

Display Prices

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GeForce 8800 GT 512MB

Amazon.com

Check prices at:

Radeon HD 3850 256MB

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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