Radeon R9 280X vs Radeon RX 5500 XT

Intro

Compare all of that to the Radeon RX 5500 XT, which uses a 7 nm design. AMD has clocked the core speed at 1717 MHz. The GDDR6 memory runs at a frequency of 1750 MHz on this model. It features 1408 SPUs along with 88 TAUs and 32 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon RX 5500 XT		130 Watts
Radeon R9 280X		250 Watts
	Difference: 120 Watts (92%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the Radeon R9 280X should be much faster than the Radeon RX 5500 XT overall. (explain)

Radeon R9 280X		288000 MB/sec
Radeon RX 5500 XT		229376 MB/sec
	Difference: 58624 (26%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon RX 5500 XT is a lot (about 39%) better at texture filtering than the Radeon R9 280X. (explain)

Radeon RX 5500 XT		151096 Mtexels/sec
Radeon R9 280X		108800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 42296 (39%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon RX 5500 XT is quite a bit (approximately 102%) faster with regards to AA than the Radeon R9 280X, and also capable of handling higher resolutions more effectively. (explain)

Radeon RX 5500 XT		54944 Mpixels/sec
Radeon R9 280X		27200 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 27744 (102%)

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 max amount of information (in units of MB per second) that can be moved over the external memory interface in one second. The number is worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR type memory, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum amount of texture map elements (texels) that can be applied per second. This number is worked out by multiplying the total number of texture units by the core speed of the chip. The higher this number, the better the graphics 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 maximum number of pixels the graphics card could possibly record to the local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the amount of ROPs by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel output rate also depends on lots of other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the maximum fill rate.