GeForce GTX 470 vs Radeon HD 4550 512MB

Intro

Compare those specifications to the Radeon HD 4550 512MB, which makes use of a 55 nm design. AMD has clocked the core frequency at 600 MHz. The GDDR3 memory runs at a speed of 800 MHz on this model. It features 80(16x5) SPUs along with 8 TAUs and 4 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 4550 512MB		25 Watts
GeForce GTX 470		215 Watts
	Difference: 190 Watts (760%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GTX 470 should in theory be quite a bit faster than the Radeon HD 4550 512MB in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 470		133920 MB/sec
Radeon HD 4550 512MB		12800 MB/sec
	Difference: 121120 (946%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 470 will be a lot (more or less 608%) faster with regards to texture filtering than the Radeon HD 4550 512MB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 470		33992 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 4550 512MB		4800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 29192 (608%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 470 should be a lot (approximately 912%) faster with regards to anti-aliasing than the Radeon HD 4550 512MB, and able to handle higher screen resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

GeForce GTX 470		24280 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4550 512MB		2400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 21880 (912%)

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 data (measured in MB per second) that can be transported over the external memory interface in a second. It is worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that are applied in one second. This figure is calculated by multiplying the total amount of texture units of the card by the core clock speed of the chip. The better this number, the better the 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 most pixels that the graphics chip can 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 - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel fill rate also depends on lots of other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the max fill rate.