Teraflop Graphic Computing begins

[Neo95]

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More significantly, the 4850 and the faster 4870, (both fuelled by the RV 770 processor) broke a virtual performance ceiling and booted graphical processors into the teraflop era.

The 4850 hit one teraflop with a core clock speed of 625 MHz. It consumed just 110 watts of power. The 4870 was rated to deliver 1.2 TFlops clocking 750 MHz and used 160 watts.

Interestingly both offerings came aggressively priced — at approximately Rs 12,000 and Rs 16,000, which was almost half of what competing cards in this category used to cost...till some of them revised their prices to compete.

AMD may not remain alone for long; indeed nVidia simultaneously launched its own new range of cards, the GTX 200 series consisting of the GeForce GTX 260 and GTX 280 cards. The GTX280 has 240 processors, while the GTX260 comes with 192 of nVidia’s G 200 processors.

A comparison of specification shows that the new nVidia cards might work to faster processor clocks ( 1.24 GHz for the 260) than the AMD/Radeon offerings. However they are known to be using DDR 3 (Double Data Rate) RAM while Radeon claims to be the first graphical cards with the new DDR5 memory which is supposed to triple the memory bandwidth.

ATI Radeon HD4870

These graphics cards are cool.They are the next gen cards.Reports say that Nvidia plans to release its own line of Teraflop cards.

 

[Kshitiz_Indian]

Teraflops hasn't really got that much of importance in graphics industry. Its just an indicator of raw power of the unit, math power if you must. But their use in graphics horsepower design measuring is limited - things like architecture, drivers, memory come into view as well. Theorotically speaking, a 4850 should easily beat a GTX 280 if you go by just the flops figures, but it obviously doesn't. It does matter in CPU's more than GPU's though.

But yes, these cards are cool. A must buy for the month!

 

[Neo95]

But their use in graphics horsepower design measuring is limited - things like architecture, drivers, memory come into view as well. Theorotically speaking, a 4850 should easily beat a GTX 280 if you go by just the flops figures, but it obviously doesn't. It does matter in CPU's more than GPU's though.

The 4850 has a DDR 5 memory while a GTX has DDR 3.The 4870 has a speed of 725 mhz.And just look at the prices
4850-Rs 12000
4870-Rs 16000!

 

[Kshitiz_Indian]

You can't compare two different cards based purely on specs. My 9600GT downclocked to 400mhz could still beat a 600mhz 8600GT HANDS DOWN!

Moreover, 4850 doesn't have DDR5 memory, the 4870 does. But it has that in 256-bit interface, while GTX has 512-bit bus, so it makes up for it their. The raw horsepower in teraflops for the 4870 might be lots, but it still fails to beat the GTX 280, because of the design, architecture and stuff. Though I'm not definitely saying that the GTX280 is a better buy than 4870, it clearly isn'ti!

Although the price drops of recent times make 4870 compete with GTX 260 - Its thrashed lol!

 

[Neo95]

Y

Although the price drops of recent times make 4870 compete with GTX 260 - Its thrashed lol!

True ATI has never managed to thrash NVidia

 

[Kshitiz_Indian]

No, I actually meant that the GTX 260 is thrashed!

 

[Neo95]

No, I actually meant that the GTX 260 is thrashed!

LOl I thought that GTX 260 thrashed 4870