Radeon HD 3470 256MB vs Radeon HD 5830

Intro

Compare that to the Radeon HD 5830, which makes use of a 40 nm design. AMD has set the core speed at 800 MHz. The GDDR5 memory is set to run at a frequency of 1000 MHz on this particular model. It features 1120(224x5) SPUs along with 56 Texture Address Units and 16 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Memory Bandwidth

The Radeon HD 5830 should theoretically be much faster than the Radeon HD 3470 256MB in general. (explain)

Radeon HD 5830		128000 MB/sec
Radeon HD 3470 256MB		30400 MB/sec
	Difference: 97600 (321%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 5830 should be much (approximately 1300%) better at anisotropic filtering than the Radeon HD 3470 256MB. (explain)

Radeon HD 5830		44800 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 3470 256MB		3200 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 41600 (1300%)

Pixel Rate

If running with a high screen resolution is important to you, then the Radeon HD 5830 is superior to the Radeon HD 3470 256MB, and very much so. (explain)

Radeon HD 5830		12800 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 3470 256MB		3200 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 9600 (300%)

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: Bandwidth is the largest amount of information (counted in MB per second) that can be moved over the external memory interface within a second. It's worked out by multiplying the interface width by the speed of its memory. If the card has DDR memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the bandwidth is, the better 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 are applied in one second. This figure is worked out by multiplying the total amount of texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The better this number, the better the graphics card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the video card can possibly write to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the amount of Render Output Units by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel output rate is also dependant on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the maximum fill rate.