ATI Radeon HD 4870 Mac Edition vs GeForce 9600M GS
Contents
Primary details
GPU architecture, market segment, value for money and other general parameters compared.
| Place in the ranking | 1375 | not rated |
| Place by popularity | not in top-100 | not in top-100 |
| Power efficiency | 1.19 | no data |
| Architecture | Tesla (2006−2010) | TeraScale (2005−2013) |
| GPU code name | G96C | RV770 |
| Market segment | Laptop | Desktop |
| Release date | 3 June 2008 (17 years ago) | 6 January 2009 (16 years ago) |
Detailed specifications
General parameters such as number of shaders, GPU core base clock and boost clock speeds, manufacturing process, texturing and calculation speed. Note that power consumption of some graphics cards can well exceed their nominal TDP, especially when overclocked.
| Pipelines / CUDA cores | 32 | 800 |
| Core clock speed | 103 MHz | 750 MHz |
| Number of transistors | 314 million | 956 million |
| Manufacturing process technology | 55 nm | 55 nm |
| Power consumption (TDP) | 20 Watt | 150 Watt |
| Texture fill rate | 6.880 | 30.00 |
| Floating-point processing power | 0.0688 TFLOPS | 1.2 TFLOPS |
| ROPs | 8 | 16 |
| TMUs | 16 | 40 |
| L1 Cache | no data | 160 KB |
| L2 Cache | 32 KB | 256 KB |
Form factor & compatibility
Information on compatibility with other computer components. Useful when choosing a future computer configuration or upgrading an existing one. For desktop graphics cards it's interface and bus (motherboard compatibility), additional power connectors (power supply compatibility).
| Laptop size | medium sized | no data |
| Interface | MXM-II | PCIe 2.0 x16 |
| Length | no data | 250 mm |
| Width | no data | 2-slot |
| Supplementary power connectors | no data | 2x 6-pin |
VRAM capacity and type
Parameters of VRAM installed: its type, size, bus, clock and resulting bandwidth. Integrated GPUs have no dedicated video RAM and use a shared part of system RAM.
| Memory type | GDDR3 | GDDR5 |
| Maximum RAM amount | 1 GB | 512 MB |
| Memory bus width | 128 Bit | 256 Bit |
| Memory clock speed | 800 MHz | 850 MHz |
| Memory bandwidth | 25.6 GB/s | 108.8 GB/s |
| Shared memory | - | - |
Connectivity and outputs
This section shows the types and number of video connectors on each GPU. The data applies specifically to desktop reference models (for example, NVIDIA’s Founders Edition). OEM partners often modify both the number and types of ports. On notebook GPUs, video‐output options are determined by the laptop’s design rather than the graphics chip itself.
| Display Connectors | No outputs | 1x DVI, 1x mini-DisplayPort |
API and SDK support
List of supported 3D and general-purpose computing APIs, including their specific versions.
| DirectX | 11.1 (10_0) | 10.1 (10_1) |
| Shader Model | 4.0 | 4.1 |
| OpenGL | 3.3 | 3.3 |
| OpenCL | 1.1 | 1.1 |
| Vulkan | N/A | N/A |
| CUDA | 1.1 | - |
Pros & cons summary
| Recency | 3 June 2008 | 6 January 2009 |
| Maximum RAM amount | 1 GB | 512 MB |
| Power consumption (TDP) | 20 Watt | 150 Watt |
9600M GS has a 100% higher maximum VRAM amount, and 650% lower power consumption.
ATI HD 4870 Mac Edition, on the other hand, has an age advantage of 7 months.
We couldn't decide between GeForce 9600M GS and Radeon HD 4870 Mac Edition. We've got no test results to judge.
Be aware that GeForce 9600M GS is a notebook graphics card while Radeon HD 4870 Mac Edition is a desktop one.
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