Radeon RX 560X vs R9 255 OEM

Primary details

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

Place in the rankingnot rated501
Place by popularitynot in top-100not in top-100
Power efficiencyno data7.65
ArchitectureGCN 1.0 (2011−2020)GCN 4.0 (2016−2020)
GPU code nameCape VerdePolaris 21
Market segmentDesktopDesktop
Release date21 December 2013 (10 years ago)11 April 2018 (6 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 cores5121024
Core clock speed900 MHz1175 MHz
Boost clock speed930 MHz1275 MHz
Number of transistors1,500 million3,000 million
Manufacturing process technology28 nm14 nm
Power consumption (TDP)65 Watt75 Watt
Texture fill rate29.7681.60
Floating-point processing power0.9523 TFLOPS2.611 TFLOPS
ROPs1616
TMUs3264

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).

InterfacePCIe 3.0 x16PCIe 3.0 x8
Lengthno data170 mm
Width2-slot2-slot
Supplementary power connectors1x 6-pinNone

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 typeGDDR5GDDR5
Maximum RAM amount2 GB4 GB
Memory bus width128 Bit128 Bit
Memory clock speed1150 MHz1750 MHz
Memory bandwidth73.6 GB/s112.0 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 ConnectorsNo outputs1x DVI, 1x HDMI, 1x DisplayPort
HDMI-+

API compatibility

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

DirectX12 (11_1)12 (12_0)
Shader Model5.16.4
OpenGL4.64.6
OpenCL1.22.0
Vulkan1.2.1311.2.131

Pros & cons summary


Recency 21 December 2013 11 April 2018
Maximum RAM amount 2 GB 4 GB
Chip lithography 28 nm 14 nm
Power consumption (TDP) 65 Watt 75 Watt

R9 255 OEM has 15.4% lower power consumption.

RX 560X, on the other hand, has an age advantage of 4 years, a 100% higher maximum VRAM amount, and a 100% more advanced lithography process.

We couldn't decide between Radeon R9 255 OEM and Radeon RX 560X. We've got no test results to judge.


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

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AMD Radeon R9 255 OEM
Radeon R9 255 OEM
AMD Radeon RX 560X
Radeon RX 560X

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Community ratings

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5 1066 votes

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Questions & comments

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