GeForce GTX 780M Mac Edition vs GTX 280

Place in the ranking	738	563
Place by popularity	not in top-100	not in top-100
Cost-effectiveness evaluation	0.12	no data
Power efficiency	0.97	3.76
Architecture	Tesla 2.0 (2007−2013)	Kepler (2012−2018)
GPU code name	GT200	GK104
Market segment	Desktop	Laptop
Release date	16 June 2008 (16 years ago)	8 November 2013 (11 years ago)
Launch price (MSRP)	$649	no data

Cost-effectiveness evaluation

Performance to price ratio. The higher, the better.

no data

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	240	1536
Core clock speed	602 MHz	771 MHz
Boost clock speed	no data	797 MHz
Number of transistors	1,400 million	3,540 million
Manufacturing process technology	65 nm	28 nm
Power consumption (TDP)	236 Watt	122 Watt
Maximum GPU temperature	105 °C	no data
Texture fill rate	48.16	102.0
Floating-point processing power	0.6221 TFLOPS	2.448 TFLOPS
ROPs	32	32
TMUs	80	128

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).

Interface	PCIe 2.0 x16	MXM-B (3.0)
Length	267 mm	no data
Height	4.376" (111 mm) (11.1 cm)	no data
Width	2-slot	no data
Supplementary power connectors	1x 6-pin + 1x 8-pin	no data
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	1 GB	4 GB
Memory bus width	512 Bit	256 Bit
Memory clock speed	1107 MHz	1250 MHz
Memory bandwidth	141.7 GB/s	160.0 GB/s

Connectivity and outputs

Types and number of video connectors present on the reviewed GPUs. As a rule, data in this section is precise only for desktop reference ones (so-called Founders Edition for NVIDIA chips). OEM manufacturers may change the number and type of output ports, while for notebook cards availability of certain video outputs ports depends on the laptop model rather than on the card itself.

Display Connectors	HDTVDual Link DVI	No outputs
Multi monitor support	+	no data
Maximum VGA resolution	2048x1536	no data
Audio input for HDMI	S/PDIF	no data

API compatibility

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

DirectX	11.1 (10_0)	12 (11_0)
Shader Model	4.0	5.1
OpenGL	2.1	4.6
OpenCL	1.1	1.2
Vulkan	N/A	1.1.126
CUDA	+	3.0

Gaming performance

Let's see how good the compared graphics cards are for gaming. Particular gaming benchmark results are measured in FPS.

Pros & cons summary

Performance score	3.33	6.70
Recency	16 June 2008	8 November 2013
Maximum RAM amount	1 GB	4 GB
Chip lithography	65 nm	28 nm
Power consumption (TDP)	236 Watt	122 Watt

GTX 780M Mac Edition has a 101.2% higher aggregate performance score, an age advantage of 5 years, a 300% higher maximum VRAM amount, a 132.1% more advanced lithography process, and 93.4% lower power consumption.

The GeForce GTX 780M Mac Edition is our recommended choice as it beats the GeForce GTX 280 in performance tests.

Be aware that GeForce GTX 280 is a desktop card while GeForce GTX 780M Mac Edition is a notebook one.

Should you still have questions concerning choice between the reviewed GPUs, ask them in Comments section, and we shall answer.