GeForce GTX 580 3GB vs Radeon RX 480 4GB

Intro

Compare those specs to the Radeon RX 480 4GB, which comes with GPU clock speed of 1120 MHz, and 4096 MB of GDDR5 memory running at 1750 MHz through a 256-bit bus. It also features 2304 Stream Processors, 144 Texture Address Units, and 32 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon RX 480 4GB		150 Watts
GeForce GTX 580 3GB		244 Watts
	Difference: 94 Watts (63%)

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the Radeon RX 480 4GB should theoretically be just a bit superior to the GeForce GTX 580 3GB in general. (explain)

Radeon RX 480 4GB		229376 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 580 3GB		192384 MB/sec
	Difference: 36992 (19%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon RX 480 4GB should be a lot (more or less 226%) better at AF than the GeForce GTX 580 3GB. (explain)

Radeon RX 480 4GB		161280 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 580 3GB		49408 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 111872 (226%)

Pixel Rate

If running with a high resolution is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 580 3GB is a better choice, though not by far. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		37056 Mpixels/sec
Radeon RX 480 4GB		35840 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 1216 (3%)

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: Memory bandwidth is the largest amount of information (measured in MB per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface within a second. It's worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR type memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum amount of texture map elements (texels) that are applied in one second. This is calculated by multiplying the total number of texture units by the core speed of the chip. The higher the texel rate, the better the card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels per second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the graphics card can possibly record to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the number of Render Output Units by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel output rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the max fill rate.