GeForce GTX 1050 3GB vs Radeon HD 3850 X2

Intro

Compare all that to the Radeon HD 3850 X2, which features clock speeds of 668 MHz on the GPU, and 828 MHz on the 512 MB of GDDR3 RAM. It features 320(64x5) SPUs as well as 16 TAUs and 16 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the Radeon HD 3850 X2 is 23% faster than the GeForce GTX 1050 3GB overall, because of its greater bandwidth. (explain)

Radeon HD 3850 X2		105984 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 1050 3GB		86016 MB/sec
	Difference: 19968 (23%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 1050 3GB will be a lot (approximately 213%) faster with regards to AF than the Radeon HD 3850 X2. (explain)

GeForce GTX 1050 3GB		66816 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 3850 X2		21376 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 45440 (213%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 1050 3GB is quite a bit (approximately 56%) better at full screen anti-aliasing than the Radeon HD 3850 X2, and also should be capable of handling higher screen resolutions better. (explain)

GeForce GTX 1050 3GB		33408 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 3850 X2		21376 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 12032 (56%)

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.

One or more cards in this comparison are multi-core. This means that their bandwidth, texel and pixel rates are theoretically doubled - this does not mean the card will actually perform twice as fast, but only that it should in theory be able to. Actual game benchmarks will give a more accurate idea of what it's capable of.

Price Comparison

Specifications

Memory Bandwidth: Memory bandwidth is the max amount of information (measured in MB per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface in one second. It is worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR type RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the bandwidth is, 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 number of texture map elements (texels) that are applied per second. This figure 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 card will be at 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 the graphics card can possibly write to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the number of Raster Operations Pipelines by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel fill rate also depends on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the max fill rate.