Radeon HD 7950 Monica BIOS 2 vs ATI Mobility HD 3870
Contents
Primary details
GPU architecture, market segment, value for money and other general parameters compared.
| Place in the ranking | 1087 | not rated |
| Place by popularity | not in top-100 | not in top-100 |
| Power efficiency | 1.74 | no data |
| Architecture | TeraScale (2005−2013) | GCN 1.0 (2012−2020) |
| GPU code name | M88 | Tahiti |
| Market segment | Laptop | Desktop |
| Release date | 4 June 2008 (17 years ago) | 31 January 2012 (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 cores | 320 | 768 |
| Core clock speed | 660 MHz | 800 MHz |
| Number of transistors | 666 million | 4,313 million |
| Manufacturing process technology | 55 nm | 28 nm |
| Power consumption (TDP) | 55 Watt | 85 Watt |
| Texture fill rate | 10.56 | 38.40 |
| Floating-point processing power | 0.4224 TFLOPS | 1.229 TFLOPS |
| ROPs | 16 | 32 |
| TMUs | 16 | 48 |
| L1 Cache | no data | 192 KB |
| L2 Cache | 256 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).
| Laptop size | large | no data |
| Interface | PCIe 2.0 x16 | PCIe 3.0 x16 |
| Length | no data | 267 mm |
| Width | no data | 2-slot |
| Supplementary power connectors | no data | 1x 6-pin + 1x 8-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 | 512 MB | 3 GB |
| Memory bus width | 256 Bit | 384 Bit |
| Memory clock speed | 850 MHz | 1250 MHz |
| Memory bandwidth | 54.4 GB/s | 240.0 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 HDMI, 2x mini-DisplayPort |
| HDMI | - | + |
API and SDK support
List of supported 3D and general-purpose computing APIs, including their specific versions.
| DirectX | 10.1 (10_1) | 12 (11_1) |
| Shader Model | 4.1 | 5.1 |
| OpenGL | 3.3 | 4.6 |
| OpenCL | N/A | 1.2 |
| Vulkan | N/A | 1.2.131 |
Pros & cons summary
| Recency | 4 June 2008 | 31 January 2012 |
| Maximum RAM amount | 512 MB | 3 GB |
| Chip lithography | 55 nm | 28 nm |
| Power consumption (TDP) | 55 Watt | 85 Watt |
ATI Mobility HD 3870 has 55% lower power consumption.
HD 7950 Monica BIOS 2, on the other hand, has an age advantage of 3 years, a 500% higher maximum VRAM amount, and a 96% more advanced lithography process.
We couldn't decide between Mobility Radeon HD 3870 and Radeon HD 7950 Monica BIOS 2. We've got no test results to judge.
Be aware that Mobility Radeon HD 3870 is a notebook graphics card while Radeon HD 7950 Monica BIOS 2 is a desktop one.
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