Radeon R9 290 vs Radeon RX 5600 XT

Intro

Compare those specifications to the Radeon RX 5600 XT, which makes use of a 7 nm design. AMD has set the core frequency at 1375 MHz. The GDDR6 memory runs at a frequency of 1500 MHz on this model. It features 2304 SPUs as well as 144 TAUs and 64 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon RX 5600 XT		160 Watts
Radeon R9 290		300 Watts
	Difference: 140 Watts (88%)

Memory Bandwidth

The Radeon RX 5600 XT should theoretically perform just a bit faster than the Radeon R9 290 overall. (explain)

Radeon RX 5600 XT		344064 MB/sec
Radeon R9 290		320000 MB/sec
	Difference: 24064 (8%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon RX 5600 XT should be quite a bit (approximately 55%) faster with regards to texture filtering than the Radeon R9 290. (explain)

Radeon RX 5600 XT		198000 Mtexels/sec
Radeon R9 290		128000 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 70000 (55%)

Pixel Rate

If running with lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the Radeon RX 5600 XT is a better choice, and very much so. (explain)

Radeon RX 5600 XT		88000 Mpixels/sec
Radeon R9 290		51200 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 36800 (72%)

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 (measured in MB per second) that can be transferred past the external memory interface within a second. The number is worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory clock speed. If the card has DDR type RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the bandwidth is, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that can be processed per second. This number is worked out by multiplying the total texture units of the card by the core clock speed of the chip. The higher this number, the better the video 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 write to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the number of Raster Operations Pipelines by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel rate is also dependant on lots of other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.