Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition vs GeForce GTX 260

Primary details

GPU architecture, market segment, value for money and other general parameters compared.

Place in the ranking	826	not rated
Place by popularity	not in top-100	not in top-100
Cost-effectiveness evaluation	0.14	no data
Power efficiency	1.21	no data
Architecture	Tesla 2.0 (2007−2013)	GCN 1.0 (2012−2020)
GPU code name	GT200	Tahiti
Market segment	Desktop	Desktop
Design	no data	reference
Release date	16 June 2008 (17 years ago)	22 June 2012 (13 years ago)
Launch price (MSRP)	$449	$499

Cost-effectiveness evaluation

The higher the ratio, the better. We use the manufacturer's recommended prices.

Performance to price scatter graph

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	192	2048
Core clock speed	576 MHz	no data
Boost clock speed	no data	1050 MHz
Number of transistors	1,400 million	4,313 million
Manufacturing process technology	65 nm	28 nm
Power consumption (TDP)	182 Watt	250 Watt
Maximum GPU temperature	105 °C	no data
Texture fill rate	36.86	134.4
Floating-point processing power	0.4769 TFLOPS	4.301 TFLOPS
ROPs	28	32
TMUs	64	128
L1 Cache	no data	512 KB
L2 Cache	224 KB	768 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).

Bus support	no data	PCIe 2.1 x16
Interface	PCIe 2.0 x16	PCIe 3.0 x16
Length	267 mm	274 mm
Height	4.376" (111 mm) (11.1 cm)	no data
Width	2-slot	2-slot
Supplementary power connectors	2x 6-pin	1x 6-pin + 1x 8-pin
SLI options	+	-

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	896 MB	3 GB
Memory bus width	448 Bit	384 Bit
Memory clock speed	999 MHz	1500 MHz
Memory bandwidth	111.9 GB/s	288 GB/s

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	Dual Link DVIHDTV	1x DVI, 1x HDMI, 2x mini-DisplayPort
Multi monitor support	+	no data
Eyefinity	-	+
HDMI	+	+
Maximum VGA resolution	2048x1536	no data
Audio input for HDMI	S/PDIF	no data

Supported technologies

Supported technological solutions. This information will prove useful if you need some particular technology for your purposes.

CrossFire	-	+
FreeSync	-	+

API and SDK support

List of supported 3D and general-purpose computing APIs, including their specific versions.

DirectX	11.1 (10_0)	DirectX® 11
Shader Model	4.0	5.1
OpenGL	2.1	4.6
OpenCL	1.1	1.2
Vulkan	N/A	-
CUDA	+	-

Pros & cons summary

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Recency	16 June 2008	22 June 2012
Maximum RAM amount	896 MB	3 GB
Chip lithography	65 nm	28 nm
Power consumption (TDP)	182 Watt	250 Watt