GeForce GTX 460 SE vs Radeon HD 5850

Intro

Compare that to the Radeon HD 5850, which features core speeds of 725 MHz on the GPU, and 1000 MHz on the 1024 MB of GDDR5 memory. It features 1440(288x5) SPUs as well as 72 TAUs and 32 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 460 SE		150 Watts
Radeon HD 5850		151 Watts
	Difference: 1 Watts (1%)

Memory Bandwidth

Performance-wise, the Radeon HD 5850 should in theory be just a bit superior to the GeForce GTX 460 SE overall. (explain)

Radeon HD 5850		128000 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 460 SE		108800 MB/sec
	Difference: 19200 (18%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 5850 will be much (approximately 67%) more effective at AF than the GeForce GTX 460 SE. (explain)

Radeon HD 5850		52200 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 460 SE		31200 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 21000 (67%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon HD 5850 will be a small bit (about 12%) more effective at anti-aliasing than the GeForce GTX 460 SE, and will be able to handle higher screen resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

Radeon HD 5850		23200 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 460 SE		20800 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 2400 (12%)

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 maximum amount of data (counted in MB per second) that can be moved over the external memory interface in a second. It's worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory speed. If it uses DDR type memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the 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 texture map elements (texels) that are processed in one second. This is worked out by multiplying the total texture units of the card by the core clock speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, the better the graphics card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels that the graphics chip can possibly write to its local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the amount of Render Output Units by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel rate also depends on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the max fill rate.