GeForce GTX 460 SE vs Radeon HD 4890 1GB

Intro

Compare those specifications to the Radeon HD 4890 1GB, which features GPU clock speed of 1000 MHz, and 1024 MB of GDDR5 memory set to run at 975 MHz through a 256-bit bus. It also features 800(160x5) Stream Processors, 40 TAUs, and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 460 SE		150 Watts
Radeon HD 4890 1GB		190 Watts
	Difference: 40 Watts (27%)

Memory Bandwidth

The Radeon HD 4890 1GB should theoretically perform a bit faster than the GeForce GTX 460 SE in general. (explain)

Radeon HD 4890 1GB		124800 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 460 SE		108800 MB/sec
	Difference: 16000 (15%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 4890 1GB should be a lot (about 28%) more effective at texture filtering than the GeForce GTX 460 SE. (explain)

Radeon HD 4890 1GB		40000 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 460 SE		31200 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 8800 (28%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 460 SE should be quite a bit (about 30%) faster with regards to FSAA than the Radeon HD 4890 1GB, and also will be able to handle higher resolutions without slowing down too much. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 SE		20800 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4890 1GB		16000 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 4800 (30%)

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 data (in units of MB per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface in one second. The number is calculated by multiplying the bus width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR type RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, 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 worked out by multiplying the total texture units of the card by the core clock speed of the chip. The higher this number, the better the card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels processed in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels the video card could possibly record to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the number of Raster Operations Pipelines by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). 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.