GeForce GTX 580 3GB vs Radeon HD 4850 512MB

Intro

Compare that to the Radeon HD 4850 512MB, which makes use of a 55 nm design. AMD has clocked the core speed at 625 MHz. The GDDR3 memory runs at a speed of 993 MHz on this specific model. It features 800(160x5) SPUs as well as 40 TAUs and 16 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 4850 512MB		110 Watts
GeForce GTX 580 3GB		244 Watts
	Difference: 134 Watts (122%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce GTX 580 3GB should be 203% faster than the Radeon HD 4850 512MB in general, because of its greater bandwidth. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		192384 MB/sec
Radeon HD 4850 512MB		63552 MB/sec
	Difference: 128832 (203%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 580 3GB should be quite a bit (about 98%) more effective at AF than the Radeon HD 4850 512MB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		49408 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 4850 512MB		25000 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 24408 (98%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 580 3GB will be much (approximately 271%) more effective at full screen anti-aliasing than the Radeon HD 4850 512MB, and also will be able to handle higher resolutions without slowing down too much. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		37056 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4850 512MB		10000 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 27056 (271%)

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 maximum amount of information (measured in MB per second) that can be moved across the external memory interface in a second. It's worked out by multiplying the interface width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR type RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that are processed in one second. This is worked out by multiplying the total amount of texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, the better the 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 could possibly record to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the number of colour ROPs by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel rate is also dependant on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the max fill rate.