GeForce GTX 590 vs Radeon HD 7850

Place in performance ranking	415	461
Place by popularity	not in top-100	not in top-100
Value for money	1.40	0.46
Architecture	GCN 1.0 (2012−2020)	Fermi (2010−2014)
GPU code name	Pitcairn	GF110
Market segment	Desktop	Desktop
Design	reference	no data
Release date	5 March 2012 (12 years old)	24 March 2011 (13 years old)
Launch price (MSRP)	$249	$699
Current price	$267 (1.1x MSRP)	$600 (0.9x MSRP)

Value for money

Performance to price ratio. The higher, the better.

HD 7850 has 204% better value for money than GTX 590.

Technical specs

General performance parameters such as number of shaders, GPU core base clock and boost clock speeds, manufacturing process, texturing and calculation speed. These parameters indirectly speak of performance, but for precise assessment you have to consider their benchmark and gaming test results. Note that power consumption of some graphics cards can well exceed their nominal TDP, especially when overclocked.

Pipelines / CUDA cores	1024	1024
CUDA cores	no data	1024
Core clock speed	no data	607 MHz
Boost clock speed	1000 MHz	no data
Number of transistors	2,800 million	3,000 million
Manufacturing process technology	28 nm	40 nm
Power consumption (TDP)	130 Watt	365 Watt
Maximum GPU temperature	no data	97 °C
Texture fill rate	55.04	77.7 billion/sec
Floating-point performance	1,761 gflops	2x 1,244.2 gflops

Size and 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	PCIe 2.1 x16	16x PCI-E 2.0
Interface	PCIe 3.0 x16	PCIe 2.0 x16
Length	210 mm	11" (280 mm) (27.9 cm)
Height	no data	4.376" (111 mm) (11.1 cm)
Width	2-slot	2-slot
Supplementary power connectors	1x 6-pin	Two 8-pin
SLI options	no data	+

Memory

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	GDDR5	GDDR5
Maximum RAM amount	2 GB	3072 MB (1536 MB per GPU)
Memory bus width	256 Bit	768-bit (384-bit per GPU)
Memory clock speed	1200 MHz	1707 MHz
Memory bandwidth	153.6 GB/s	327.7 GB/s
Shared memory	no data	-

Video outputs and ports

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	1x DVI, 1x HDMI, 2x mini-DisplayPort	Three Dual Link DVI-IMini DisplayPort
Multi monitor support	no data	+
Eyefinity	1	no data
HDMI	+	+
Maximum VGA resolution	no data	2048x1536
DisplayPort support	-	no data
Audio input for HDMI	no data	Internal

Technologies

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

AppAcceleration	-	no data
CrossFire	1	no data
Enduro	-	no data
FreeSync	1	no data
HD3D	-	no data
PowerTune	-	no data
TrueAudio	-	no data
ZeroCore	-	no data

API support

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

DirectX	12	12 (11_0)
Shader Model	5.1	5.1
OpenGL	4.6	4.2
OpenCL	1.2	1.1
Vulkan	+	N/A
Mantle	-	no data
CUDA	no data	+

Synthetic benchmark performance

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

Combined synthetic benchmark score

This is our combined benchmark performance 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.

HD 7850 9.95
+15.3%

GTX 590 8.63

Radeon HD 7850 outperforms GeForce GTX 590 by 15% based on our aggregated benchmark results.

Passmark

This is the most ubiquitous GPU benchmark, part of Passmark PerformanceTest suite. It gives the graphics card a thorough evaluation under various types of load, providing four separate benchmarks for Direct3D versions 9, 10, 11 and 12 (the last being done in 4K resolution if possible), and few more tests engaging DirectCompute capabilities.

Benchmark coverage: 25%

HD 7850 3854
+15.4%

GTX 590 3341

Radeon HD 7850 outperforms GeForce GTX 590 by 15% in Passmark.

3DMark Fire Strike Graphics

Fire Strike is a DirectX 11 benchmark for gaming PCs. It features two separate tests displaying a fight between a humanoid and a fiery creature made of lava. Using 1920x1080 resolution, Fire Strike shows off some realistic graphics and is quite taxing on hardware.

Benchmark coverage: 14%

HD 7850 5210

GTX 590 6680
+28.2%

GeForce GTX 590 outperforms Radeon HD 7850 by 28% in 3DMark Fire Strike Graphics.

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:

900p	50−55 +6.4%	47 −6.4%
Full HD	120−130 +10.1%	109 −10.1%
1200p	120−130 +7.1%	112 −7.1%

Advantages and disadvantages

Performance score	9.95	8.63
Recency	5 March 2012	24 March 2011
Cost	$249	$699
Maximum RAM amount	2 GB	3072 MB (1536 MB per GPU)
Chip lithography	28 nm	40 nm
Power consumption (TDP)	130 Watt	365 Watt