Radeon HD 4870 512MB vs Radeon R9 M385X

Intro

Compare those specifications to the Radeon R9 M385X, which features GPU core speed of 1100 MHz, and 4096 MB of GDDR5 memory set to run at 1500 MHz through a 128-bit bus. It also is comprised of 896 Stream Processors, 56 Texture Address Units, and 16 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Memory Bandwidth

Performance-wise, the Radeon HD 4870 512MB should theoretically be a small bit superior to the Radeon R9 M385X in general. (explain)

Radeon HD 4870 512MB		115200 MB/sec
Radeon R9 M385X		96000 MB/sec
	Difference: 19200 (20%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon R9 M385X is a lot (about 105%) better at AF than the Radeon HD 4870 512MB. (explain)

Radeon R9 M385X		61600 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 4870 512MB		30000 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 31600 (105%)

Pixel Rate

If running with lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the Radeon R9 M385X is a better choice, by far. (explain)

Radeon R9 M385X		17600 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4870 512MB		12000 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 5600 (47%)

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 max amount of information (measured in MB per second) that can be transported across the external memory interface within a second. The number is worked out by multiplying the bus width by its memory speed. In the case of DDR RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that can be applied per second. This is worked out by multiplying the total amount of texture units by the core clock speed of the chip. The better this number, the better the video card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels processed in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels that the graphics card could possibly write to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the amount of Raster Operations Pipelines by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel output rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the maximum fill rate.