GeForce 8600M GT Mac Edition vs ATI Radeon HD 3870
Contents
Primary details
GPU architecture, market segment, value for money and other general parameters compared.
| Place in the ranking | 1061 | not rated |
| Place by popularity | not in top-100 | not in top-100 |
| Cost-effectiveness evaluation | 0.05 | no data |
| Power efficiency | 0.96 | no data |
| Architecture | TeraScale (2005−2013) | Tesla (2006−2010) |
| GPU code name | RV670 | G84 |
| Market segment | Desktop | Laptop |
| Release date | 19 November 2007 (18 years ago) | 5 October 2007 (18 years ago) |
| Launch price (MSRP) | $269 | no data |
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 | 320 | 32 |
| Core clock speed | 777 MHz | 470 MHz |
| Number of transistors | 666 million | 289 million |
| Manufacturing process technology | 55 nm | 80 nm |
| Power consumption (TDP) | 106 Watt | 20 Watt |
| Texture fill rate | 12.43 | 7.520 |
| Floating-point processing power | 0.4973 TFLOPS | 0.06016 TFLOPS |
| ROPs | 16 | 8 |
| TMUs | 16 | 16 |
| L2 Cache | 256 KB | 32 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).
| Interface | PCIe 2.0 x16 | MXM-II |
| Length | 241 mm | no data |
| Width | 2-slot | no data |
| Supplementary power connectors | 1x 6-pin | no 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 type | GDDR4 | GDDR3 |
| Maximum RAM amount | 512 MB | 512 MB |
| Memory bus width | 256 Bit | 128 Bit |
| Memory clock speed | 1126 MHz | 635 MHz |
| Memory bandwidth | 72.06 GB/s | 20.32 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 | 2x DVI, 1x S-Video | No outputs |
API and SDK support
List of supported 3D and general-purpose computing APIs, including their specific versions.
| DirectX | 10.1 (10_1) | 11.1 (10_0) |
| Shader Model | 4.1 | 4.0 |
| OpenGL | 3.3 (full) 4.0 (partial) | 3.3 |
| OpenCL | N/A | 1.1 |
| Vulkan | N/A | N/A |
| CUDA | - | 1.1 |
Pros & cons summary
| Recency | 19 November 2007 | 5 October 2007 |
| Chip lithography | 55 nm | 80 nm |
| Power consumption (TDP) | 106 Watt | 20 Watt |
ATI HD 3870 has an age advantage of 1 month, and a 45.5% more advanced lithography process.
8600M GT Mac Edition, on the other hand, has 430% lower power consumption.
We couldn't decide between Radeon HD 3870 and GeForce 8600M GT Mac Edition. We've got no test results to judge.
Be aware that Radeon HD 3870 is a desktop graphics card while GeForce 8600M GT Mac Edition is a notebook one.
Other comparisons
We selected several comparisons of graphics cards with performance close to those reviewed, providing you with more options to consider.
