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Radeon HD 3850 1GB vs Radeon HD 3870 X2 512MB

Intro

The Radeon HD 3850 1GB has a GPU core clock speed of 668 MHz, and the 1024 MB of GDDR3 RAM runs at 828 MHz through a 256-bit bus. It also is made up of 320(64x5) SPUs, 16 TAUs, and 16 Raster Operation Units.

Compare those specifications to the Radeon HD 3870 X2 512MB, which comes with a core clock speed of 825 MHz and a GDDR3 memory frequency of 900 MHz. It also makes use of a 256-bit memory bus, and makes use of a 55 nm design. It is comprised of 320(64x5) SPUs, 16 Texture Address Units, and 16 Raster Operation Units.

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the Radeon HD 3870 X2 512MB will be 117% quicker than the Radeon HD 3850 1GB in general, because of its higher bandwidth. (explain)

Radeon HD 3870 X2 512MB 115200 MB/sec
Radeon HD 3850 1GB 52992 MB/sec
Difference: 62208 (117%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 3870 X2 512MB should be quite a bit (about 147%) more effective at anisotropic filtering than the Radeon HD 3850 1GB. (explain)

Radeon HD 3870 X2 512MB 26400 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 3850 1GB 10688 Mtexels/sec
Difference: 15712 (147%)

Pixel Rate

If running with high levels of AA is important to you, then the Radeon HD 3870 X2 512MB is superior to the Radeon HD 3850 1GB, by a large margin. (explain)

Radeon HD 3870 X2 512MB 26400 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 3850 1GB 10688 Mpixels/sec
Difference: 15712 (147%)

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

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Radeon HD 3850 1GB

Amazon.com

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Radeon HD 3870 X2 512MB

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 Radeon HD 3850 1GB Radeon HD 3870 X2 512MB
Manufacturer AMD AMD
Year Nov 19, 2007 Jan 28, 2008
Code Name RV670 PRO R680
Memory 1024 MB 512 MB (x2)
Core Speed 668 MHz 825 MHz (x2)
Memory Speed 1656 MHz 1800 MHz (x2)
Power (Max TDP) 75 watts (Unknown) watts
Bandwidth 52992 MB/sec 115200 MB/sec
Texel Rate 10688 Mtexels/sec 26400 Mtexels/sec
Pixel Rate 10688 Mpixels/sec 26400 Mpixels/sec
Unified Shaders 320(64x5) 320(64x5) (x2)
Texture Mapping Units 16 16 (x2)
Render Output Units 16 16 (x2)
Bus Type GDDR3 GDDR3
Bus Width 256-bit 256-bit (x2)
Fab Process 55 nm 55 nm
Transistors (Unknown) million (Unknown) million
Bus PCIe 2.0 x16/AGP 8x PCIe 2.0 x16/(internal PCIe 1.1 x16)
DirectX Version DirectX 10.1 DirectX 10.1
OpenGL Version OpenGL 3.0 OpenGL 3.0

Memory Bandwidth: Bandwidth is the largest amount of information (in units of megabytes per second) that can be transported across the external memory interface within a second. It is worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR type RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the 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 number of texture map elements (texels) that are applied in one second. This number is worked out by multiplying the total texture units by the core speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, the better the graphics card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels processed in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels that the graphics card can possibly write to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the number of Render Output Units 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 fill rate also depends on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the maximum fill rate.

Display Prices

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Radeon HD 3850 1GB

Amazon.com

Check prices at:

Radeon HD 3870 X2 512MB

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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