Radeon R9 285 vs Radeon RX 6500 XT

Intro

Compare those specs to the Radeon RX 6500 XT, which uses a 6 nm design. AMD has clocked the core frequency at 2200 MHz. The GDDR6 memory works at a frequency of 2250 MHz on this specific card. It features 1024 SPUs as well as 64 Texture Address Units and 32 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon RX 6500 XT		107 Watts
Radeon R9 285		190 Watts
	Difference: 83 Watts (78%)

Memory Bandwidth

Performance-wise, the Radeon R9 285 should in theory be a small bit superior to the Radeon RX 6500 XT in general. (explain)

Radeon R9 285		176000 MB/sec
Radeon RX 6500 XT		147456 MB/sec
	Difference: 28544 (19%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon RX 6500 XT should be quite a bit (approximately 37%) better at texture filtering than the Radeon R9 285. (explain)

Radeon RX 6500 XT		140800 Mtexels/sec
Radeon R9 285		102816 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 37984 (37%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon RX 6500 XT should be quite a bit (approximately 140%) better at anti-aliasing than the Radeon R9 285, and able to handle higher resolutions better. (explain)

Radeon RX 6500 XT		70400 Mpixels/sec
Radeon R9 285		29376 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 41024 (140%)

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 data (measured in MB per second) that can be transported across the external memory interface in a second. The number is worked out by multiplying the interface width by the speed of its memory. If the card has DDR type RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and higher screen 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 amount of texture units of the card by the core clock speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, the better the video card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels applied per second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels the graphics card could possibly write to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the number of Render Output Units 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 rate also depends on lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the max fill rate.