GeForce GTX 570 vs Radeon HD 4850 X2 512MB

Intro

Compare those specs to the Radeon HD 4850 X2 512MB, which uses a 55 nm design. AMD has set the core speed at 625 MHz. The GDDR3 memory is set to run at a speed of 993 MHz on this model. It features 800(160x5) SPUs as well as 40 TAUs and 16 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 570		219 Watts
Radeon HD 4850 X2 512MB		250 Watts
	Difference: 31 Watts (14%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GTX 570, in theory, should perform a small bit faster than the Radeon HD 4850 X2 512MB in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 570		152000 MB/sec
Radeon HD 4850 X2 512MB		127104 MB/sec
	Difference: 24896 (20%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 4850 X2 512MB should be a little bit (more or less 14%) faster with regards to AF than the GeForce GTX 570. (explain)

Radeon HD 4850 X2 512MB		50000 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 570		43920 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 6080 (14%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 570 is quite a bit (more or less 46%) better at FSAA than the Radeon HD 4850 X2 512MB, and also should be able to handle higher resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

GeForce GTX 570		29280 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4850 X2 512MB		20000 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 9280 (46%)

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: Memory bandwidth is the maximum amount of data (in units of MB per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface in a second. It's calculated by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory clock speed. If the card has DDR type memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the bandwidth is, 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 processed per second. This figure is worked out by multiplying the total amount of texture units by the core clock speed of the chip. The higher the texel rate, the better the card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels processed per second.

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