Compare any two graphics cards:
VS

Radeon HD 4850 2GB vs Radeon HD 6870

Intro

The Radeon HD 4850 2GB makes use of a 55 nm design. AMD has set the core speed at 625 MHz. The GDDR4 memory works at a speed of 993 MHz on this card. It features 800(160x5) SPUs along with 40 TAUs and 16 ROPs.

Compare all that to the Radeon HD 6870, which makes use of a 40 nm design. AMD has set the core speed at 900 MHz. The GDDR5 memory runs at a speed of 1050 MHz on this particular card. It features 1120 SPUs as well as 56 TAUs and 32 ROPs.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 4850 2GB 110 Watts
Radeon HD 6870 151 Watts
Difference: 41 Watts (37%)

Memory Bandwidth

The Radeon HD 6870, in theory, should perform a lot faster than the Radeon HD 4850 2GB in general. (explain)

Radeon HD 6870 134400 MB/sec
Radeon HD 4850 2GB 63552 MB/sec
Difference: 70848 (111%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 6870 is much (approximately 102%) better at AF than the Radeon HD 4850 2GB. (explain)

Radeon HD 6870 50400 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 4850 2GB 25000 Mtexels/sec
Difference: 25400 (102%)

Pixel Rate

If using a high resolution is important to you, then the Radeon HD 6870 is the winner, by far. (explain)

Radeon HD 6870 28800 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4850 2GB 10000 Mpixels/sec
Difference: 18800 (188%)

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

Display Prices

Hide Prices

Radeon HD 4850 2GB

Amazon.com

Check prices at:

Radeon HD 6870

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.

Specifications

Display Specifications

Hide Specifications

Model Radeon HD 4850 2GB Radeon HD 6870
Manufacturer AMD AMD
Year Jun 25, 2008 October 2010
Code Name RV770 PRO Barts XT
Memory 2048 MB 1024 MB
Core Speed 625 MHz 900 MHz
Memory Speed 1986 MHz 4200 MHz
Power (Max TDP) 110 watts 151 watts
Bandwidth 63552 MB/sec 134400 MB/sec
Texel Rate 25000 Mtexels/sec 50400 Mtexels/sec
Pixel Rate 10000 Mpixels/sec 28800 Mpixels/sec
Unified Shaders 800(160x5) 1120
Texture Mapping Units 40 56
Render Output Units 16 32
Bus Type GDDR4 GDDR5
Bus Width 256-bit 256-bit
Fab Process 55 nm 40 nm
Transistors 956 million 1700 million
Bus PCIe 2.0 x16 PCIe x16
DirectX Version DirectX 10.1 DirectX 11
OpenGL Version OpenGL 3.0 OpenGL 4.1

Memory Bandwidth: Memory bandwidth is the max amount of data (counted in megabytes per second) that can be transferred across the external memory interface in a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory clock speed. In the case of DDR type RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that can be applied per second. This is worked out by multiplying the total texture units 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 in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the video card could possibly record to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the number of Render Output Units by the clock speed of the card. 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 output rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the max fill rate.

Display Prices

Hide Prices

Radeon HD 4850 2GB

Amazon.com

Check prices at:

Radeon HD 6870

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.

Comments

Be the first to leave a comment!

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *


*

WordPress Anti Spam by WP-SpamShield