ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5850 vs GeForce GTX 280M

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Aggregate performance score

We've compared GeForce GTX 280M and Mobility Radeon HD 5850, covering specs and all relevant benchmarks.

GTX 280M
2009
1 GB GDDR3, 75 Watt
1.49

ATI Mobility HD 5850 outperforms GTX 280M by a significant 28% based on our aggregate benchmark results.

Primary details

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

Place in the ranking980907
Place by popularitynot in top-100not in top-100
Power efficiency1.364.37
ArchitectureTesla (2006−2010)TeraScale 2 (2009−2015)
GPU code nameG92Broadway
Market segmentLaptopLaptop
Release date3 March 2009 (15 years ago)7 January 2010 (14 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 cores128800
Core clock speed585 MHz500 MHz
Number of transistors754 million1,040 million
Manufacturing process technology65 nm40 nm
Power consumption (TDP)75 Watt30 Watt
Texture fill rate37.4420.00
Floating-point processing power0.3745 TFLOPS0.8 TFLOPS
Gigaflops562no data
ROPs1616
TMUs6440

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 sizelargelarge
Bus supportPCI-E 2.0no data
InterfaceMXM-IVPCIe 2.0 x16
SLI options+-
MXM TypeMXM 3.0 Type-Bno data

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 typeGDDR3GDDR5
Maximum RAM amount1 GB1 GB
Memory bus width256 Bit128 Bit
Memory clock speedUp to 950 MHz1000 MHz
Memory bandwidth61 GB/s64 GB/s
Shared memory--

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 ConnectorsHDMIDual Link DVISingle Link DVIDisplayPortLVDSVGANo outputs
HDMI+-
Maximum VGA resolution2048x1536no data
Audio input for HDMIS/PDIFno data

Supported technologies

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

Power management8.0no data

API compatibility

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

DirectX11.1 (10_0)11.2 (11_0)
Shader Model4.05.0
OpenGL2.14.4
OpenCL1.11.2
VulkanN/AN/A
CUDA+-

Synthetic benchmark performance

Non-gaming benchmark results comparison. The combined score is measured on a 0-100 point scale.


Combined synthetic benchmark score

This is our combined benchmark score. We are regularly improving our combining algorithms, but if you find some perceived inconsistencies, feel free to speak up in comments section, we usually fix problems quickly.

GTX 280M 1.49
ATI Mobility HD 5850 1.91
+28.2%

3DMark Vantage Performance

3DMark Vantage is an outdated DirectX 10 benchmark using 1280x1024 screen resolution. It taxes the graphics card with two scenes, one depicting a girl escaping some militarized base located within a sea cave, the other displaying a space fleet attack on a defenseless planet. It was discontinued in April 2017, and Time Spy benchmark is now recommended to be used instead.

GTX 280M 6672
+19.3%
ATI Mobility HD 5850 5592

Gaming performance

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

Average FPS across all PC games

Here are the average frames per second in a large set of popular games across different resolutions:

900p14−16
−35.7%
19
+35.7%
Full HD18−20
−33.3%
24
+33.3%

FPS performance in popular games

Full HD
Low Preset

Cyberpunk 2077 4−5
+0%
4−5
+0%

Full HD
Medium Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey 6−7
−16.7%
7−8
+16.7%
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4−5
−25%
5−6
+25%
Cyberpunk 2077 4−5
+0%
4−5
+0%
Far Cry 5 2−3
−50%
3−4
+50%
Far Cry New Dawn 4−5
−25%
5−6
+25%
Forza Horizon 4 4−5
−100%
8−9
+100%
Hitman 3 6−7
−16.7%
7−8
+16.7%
Horizon Zero Dawn 14−16
−20%
18−20
+20%
Red Dead Redemption 2 3−4
−33.3%
4−5
+33.3%
Shadow of the Tomb Raider 8−9
−25%
10−11
+25%
Watch Dogs: Legion 30−35
−6.1%
35−40
+6.1%

Full HD
High Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey 6−7
−16.7%
7−8
+16.7%
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4−5
−25%
5−6
+25%
Cyberpunk 2077 4−5
+0%
4−5
+0%
Far Cry 5 2−3
−50%
3−4
+50%
Far Cry New Dawn 4−5
−25%
5−6
+25%
Forza Horizon 4 4−5
−100%
8−9
+100%
Hitman 3 6−7
−16.7%
7−8
+16.7%
Horizon Zero Dawn 14−16
−20%
18−20
+20%
Red Dead Redemption 2 3−4
−33.3%
4−5
+33.3%
Shadow of the Tomb Raider 8−9
−25%
10−11
+25%
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt 10−12
−9.1%
12−14
+9.1%
Watch Dogs: Legion 30−35
−6.1%
35−40
+6.1%

Full HD
Ultra Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey 6−7
−16.7%
7−8
+16.7%
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4−5
−25%
5−6
+25%
Cyberpunk 2077 4−5
+0%
4−5
+0%
Far Cry 5 2−3
−50%
3−4
+50%
Forza Horizon 4 4−5
−100%
8−9
+100%
Hitman 3 6−7
−16.7%
7−8
+16.7%
Horizon Zero Dawn 14−16
−20%
18−20
+20%
Shadow of the Tomb Raider 8−9
−25%
10−11
+25%
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt 10−12
−9.1%
12−14
+9.1%
Watch Dogs: Legion 30−35
−6.1%
35−40
+6.1%

Full HD
Epic Preset

Red Dead Redemption 2 3−4
−33.3%
4−5
+33.3%

1440p
High Preset

Battlefield 5 2−3
−50%
3−4
+50%
Far Cry New Dawn 2−3
−50%
3−4
+50%

1440p
Ultra Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey 1−2
−100%
2−3
+100%
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 0−1 1−2
Cyberpunk 2077 1−2
+0%
1−2
+0%
Far Cry 5 2−3
+0%
2−3
+0%
Hitman 3 7−8
+0%
7−8
+0%
Horizon Zero Dawn 5−6
−20%
6−7
+20%
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt 1−2
+0%
1−2
+0%
Watch Dogs: Legion 7−8
−57.1%
10−12
+57.1%

1440p
Epic Preset

Red Dead Redemption 2 4−5
−25%
5−6
+25%

4K
High Preset

Far Cry New Dawn 1−2
+0%
1−2
+0%

4K
Ultra Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey 1−2
−100%
2−3
+100%
Assassin's Creed Valhalla 1−2
+0%
1−2
+0%
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 0−1 0−1
Far Cry 5 0−1 1−2

4K
Epic Preset

Red Dead Redemption 2 3−4
+0%
3−4
+0%

Full HD
Medium Preset

Battlefield 5 1−2
+0%
1−2
+0%

Full HD
High Preset

Battlefield 5 1−2
+0%
1−2
+0%

4K
Ultra Preset

Watch Dogs: Legion 0−1 0−1

This is how GTX 280M and ATI Mobility HD 5850 compete in popular games:

  • ATI Mobility HD 5850 is 36% faster in 900p
  • ATI Mobility HD 5850 is 33% faster in 1080p

Here's the range of performance differences observed across popular games:

  • in Forza Horizon 4, with 1080p resolution and the Medium Preset, the ATI Mobility HD 5850 is 100% faster.

All in all, in popular games:

  • ATI Mobility HD 5850 is ahead in 38 tests (75%)
  • there's a draw in 13 tests (25%)

Pros & cons summary


Performance score 1.49 1.91
Recency 3 March 2009 7 January 2010
Chip lithography 65 nm 40 nm
Power consumption (TDP) 75 Watt 30 Watt

ATI Mobility HD 5850 has a 28.2% higher aggregate performance score, an age advantage of 10 months, a 62.5% more advanced lithography process, and 150% lower power consumption.

The Mobility Radeon HD 5850 is our recommended choice as it beats the GeForce GTX 280M in performance tests.


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

Vote for your favorite

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NVIDIA GeForce GTX 280M
GeForce GTX 280M
ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5850
Mobility Radeon HD 5850

Comparisons with similar GPUs

We selected several comparisons of graphics cards with performance close to those reviewed, providing you with more options to consider.

Community ratings

Here you can see the user ratings of the compared graphics cards, as well as rate them yourself.


4.1 8 votes

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4 13 votes

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Questions & comments

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