GeForce GT 310 vs Radeon HD 4650 512MB

Intro

Compare that to the Radeon HD 4650 512MB, which features clock speeds of 600 MHz on the GPU, and 500 MHz on the 512 MB of DDR2 memory. It features 320(64x5) SPUs as well as 32 TAUs and 8 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GT 310		31 Watts
Radeon HD 4650 512MB		55 Watts
	Difference: 24 Watts (77%)

Memory Bandwidth

Both cards have the exact same memory bandwidth, so in theory they should have identical performance. (explain)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 4650 512MB is quite a bit (about 307%) better at texture filtering than the GeForce GT 310. (explain)

Radeon HD 4650 512MB		19200 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GT 310		4712 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 14488 (307%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon HD 4650 512MB is a lot (approximately 104%) more effective at FSAA than the GeForce GT 310, and will be capable of handling higher screen resolutions without slowing down too much. (explain)

Radeon HD 4650 512MB		4800 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GT 310		2356 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 2444 (104%)

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 largest amount of data (counted in megabytes 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 its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR memory, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that can be processed per second. This figure is calculated by multiplying the total 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 processed in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the video card could possibly record to its local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the amount of Raster Operations Pipelines 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 rate is also dependant on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the max fill rate.