GeForce GT 240 GDDR5 vs Radeon HD 4850 512MB

Intro

Compare that to the Radeon HD 4850 512MB, which makes use of a 55 nm design. AMD has set the core frequency at 625 MHz. The GDDR3 memory is set to run at a speed of 993 MHz on this specific card. It features 800(160x5) SPUs along with 40 TAUs and 16 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GT 240 GDDR5		70 Watts
Radeon HD 4850 512MB		110 Watts
	Difference: 40 Watts (57%)

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the Radeon HD 4850 512MB should in theory be a bit superior to the GeForce GT 240 GDDR5 overall. (explain)

Radeon HD 4850 512MB		63552 MB/sec
GeForce GT 240 GDDR5		54400 MB/sec
	Difference: 9152 (17%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 4850 512MB should be quite a bit (more or less 42%) more effective at AF than the GeForce GT 240 GDDR5. (explain)

Radeon HD 4850 512MB		25000 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GT 240 GDDR5		17600 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 7400 (42%)

Pixel Rate

If running with a high screen resolution is important to you, then the Radeon HD 4850 512MB is a better choice, by a large margin. (explain)

Radeon HD 4850 512MB		10000 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GT 240 GDDR5		4400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 5600 (127%)

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 (counted in MB per second) that can be transferred across the external memory interface in one second. It is worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory speed. In the case of DDR type RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses 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 can be applied in one second. This is worked out by multiplying the total number of texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The higher the texel rate, the better the graphics card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the video card can possibly write to the local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the number of Raster Operations Pipelines by the clock speed of the card. 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 lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.