GeForce GTX 580 3GB vs Radeon HD 4870 X2

Intro

Compare those specs to the Radeon HD 4870 X2, which has a clock frequency of 750 MHz and a GDDR5 memory frequency of 900 MHz. It also makes use of a 256-bit bus, and makes use of a 55 nm design. It is comprised of 800(160x5) SPUs, 40 TAUs, and 16 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		244 Watts
Radeon HD 4870 X2		350 Watts
	Difference: 106 Watts (43%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the Radeon HD 4870 X2 is 20% quicker than the GeForce GTX 580 3GB in general, due to its greater bandwidth. (explain)

Radeon HD 4870 X2		230400 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 580 3GB		192384 MB/sec
	Difference: 38016 (20%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 4870 X2 is quite a bit (approximately 21%) faster with regards to texture filtering than the GeForce GTX 580 3GB. (explain)

Radeon HD 4870 X2		60000 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 580 3GB		49408 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 10592 (21%)

Pixel Rate

If running with lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 580 3GB is the winner, by a large margin. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		37056 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4870 X2		24000 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 13056 (54%)

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

Specifications

Memory Bandwidth: Bandwidth is the largest amount of data (measured in MB per second) that can be moved across the external memory interface in one second. The number is worked out by multiplying the interface width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum 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 clock speed of the chip. The higher this number, the better the card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels applied in a second.

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