Radeon HD 6870 vs GeForce GTX 660

Radeon HD 6870
Memory: 1024Mb GDDR5DESKTOP
Release date: 21 Oct 2010
Radeon HD 6870
GeForce GTX 660
Memory: 2048Mb GDDR5DESKTOP
Release date: 6 Sep 2012
GeForce GTX 660

Summary

Synthetic performance index

  • Radeon HD 6870
    100%
  • GeForce GTX 660
    149%

Relative performance

Gaming performance index

  • Radeon HD 6870
    100%
  • GeForce GTX 660
    141%

Relative performance

Reasons to consider Radeon HD 6870

Based on an outdated architecture (ATI TeraScale), there are no performance optimizations for current games and applications

Reasons to consider GeForce GTX 660

41% higher gaming performance.
This is a much newer product, it might have better long term support.
Supports PhysX
Supports G-Sync
Supports ShadowPlay (allows game streaming/recording with minimum performance penalty)
Based on an outdated architecture (Nvidia Kepler), there are less performance optimizations for current games and applications

GeForce GTX 660

HWBench recommends GeForce GTX 660

The GeForce GTX 660 is the better performing card based on the game benchmark suite used (43 combinations of games and resolutions).


Specifications

Core Configuration

Radeon HD 6870GeForce GTX 660
GPU NameBarts (Barts XT)vsGK106 (GK106-400-A1)
Fab Process40 nmvs28 nm
Die Size255 mm²vs221 mm²
Transistors1,700 millionvs2,540 million
Shaders1120vs960
Compute Units14vs5
Core clock900 MHzvs980 MHz
ROPs32vs24
TMUs56vs80

Memory Configuration

Radeon HD 6870GeForce GTX 660
Memory TypeGDDR5vsGDDR5
Bus Width256 bitvs192 bit
Memory Speed1050 MHz
4200 MHz effective
vs1502 MHz
6008 MHz effective
Memory Size1024 Mbvs2048 Mb

Additional details

Radeon HD 6870GeForce GTX 660
TDP151 wattsvs140 watts
Release Date21 Oct 2010vs6 Sep 2012

Raw Performance comparison

Pixel Rate

  • Radeon HD 6870
    28.80 GP/s
  • GeForce GTX 660
    19.60 GP/s

GigaPixels - higher is better

Texel Rate

  • Radeon HD 6870
    50.40 GT/s
  • GeForce GTX 660
    78.40 GT/s

GigaTexels - higher is better

Memory bandwidth

  • Radeon HD 6870
    134.00 GB/s
  • GeForce GTX 660
    144.00 GB/s

GB/s - higher is better

Single precision performance

  • Radeon HD 6870
    2016.00 GFLOPs
  • GeForce GTX 660
    1882.00 GFLOPs

GFLOPs - higher is better

Synthetic benchmarks

3DMark 11

  • Radeon HD 6870
    4540
  • GeForce GTX 660
    6800

Points (higher is better)

Game benchmarks

Alan Wake

  • Radeon HD 6870
    45
  • GeForce GTX 660
    53.7

FPS (higher is better)

Batman: Arkham City

  • Radeon HD 6870
    48.7
  • GeForce GTX 660
    68.5

FPS (higher is better)

Battlefield 3

  • Radeon HD 6870
    30.9
  • GeForce GTX 660
    49.7

FPS (higher is better)

Battlefield 4

DX11, Ultra Quality,2x MSAA,16x AF, HBAO

  • Radeon HD 6870
    23
  • GeForce GTX 660
    43

FPS (higher is better)

Bioshock Infinite

DX11, Ultra Quality,DDOD, FX AA

  • Radeon HD 6870
    29
  • GeForce GTX 660
    50

FPS (higher is better)

Borderlands 2

  • Radeon HD 6870
    61.8
  • GeForce GTX 660
    88.6

FPS (higher is better)

Crysis

  • Radeon HD 6870
    30.8
  • GeForce GTX 660
    38.4

FPS (higher is better)

Crysis 2

  • Radeon HD 6870
    31.3
  • GeForce GTX 660
    46.1

FPS (higher is better)

Crysis 3

DX11,Very High Quality, FXAA

  • Radeon HD 6870
    17
  • GeForce GTX 660
    30

FPS (higher is better)

Diablo III

  • Radeon HD 6870
    85.1
  • GeForce GTX 660
    111.9

FPS (higher is better)

Dragon Age II

  • Radeon HD 6870
    32.4
  • GeForce GTX 660
    46.1

FPS (higher is better)

F1 2012

  • Radeon HD 6870
    52.5
  • GeForce GTX 660
    70.5

FPS (higher is better)

Max Payne 3

  • Radeon HD 6870
    36.1
  • GeForce GTX 660
    51.1

FPS (higher is better)

Medal Of Honor Warfighter

DX11, Ultra Quality, 4xMSAA

  • Radeon HD 6870
    25
  • GeForce GTX 660
    39

FPS (higher is better)

Metro 2033

  • Radeon HD 6870
    17.6
  • GeForce GTX 660
    21.7

FPS (higher is better)

Sleeping Dogs

  • Radeon HD 6870
    39.8
  • GeForce GTX 660
    46.9

FPS (higher is better)

Sniper Elite V2

  • Radeon HD 6870
    39
  • GeForce GTX 660
    43.9

FPS (higher is better)

STALKER: Call of Pripyat

  • Radeon HD 6870
    49.6
  • GeForce GTX 660
    65.7

FPS (higher is better)

StarCraft II

  • Radeon HD 6870
    106.7
  • GeForce GTX 660
    166.8

FPS (higher is better)

The Elder Scrolls: Skyrim

  • Radeon HD 6870
    48
  • GeForce GTX 660
    59.1

FPS (higher is better)

Total War: Shogun 2

  • Radeon HD 6870
    28.3
  • GeForce GTX 660
    41

FPS (higher is better)

Unigine Heaven 2.0

  • Radeon HD 6870
    27.1
  • GeForce GTX 660
    46.4

FPS (higher is better)

World of Warcraft: Mists of Pandaria

  • Radeon HD 6870
    52.8
  • GeForce GTX 660
    72

FPS (higher is better)

Alan Wake

  • Radeon HD 6870
    28.1
  • GeForce GTX 660
    32.8

FPS (higher is better)

Batman: Arkham City

  • Radeon HD 6870
    30.2
  • GeForce GTX 660
    41.5

FPS (higher is better)

Battlefield 3

  • Radeon HD 6870
    17.6
  • GeForce GTX 660
    30.2

FPS (higher is better)

Borderlands 2

  • Radeon HD 6870
    38.4
  • GeForce GTX 660
    54.7

FPS (higher is better)

Crysis

  • Radeon HD 6870
    18.8
  • GeForce GTX 660
    23.2

FPS (higher is better)

Crysis 2

  • Radeon HD 6870
    19
  • GeForce GTX 660
    26.9

FPS (higher is better)

Diablo III

  • Radeon HD 6870
    59.4
  • GeForce GTX 660
    75.9

FPS (higher is better)

Dragon Age II

  • Radeon HD 6870
    22.2
  • GeForce GTX 660
    30.4

FPS (higher is better)

F1 2012

  • Radeon HD 6870
    36.9
  • GeForce GTX 660
    49.7

FPS (higher is better)

Max Payne 3

  • Radeon HD 6870
    24.7
  • GeForce GTX 660
    34.2

FPS (higher is better)

Metro 2033

  • Radeon HD 6870
    11.4
  • GeForce GTX 660
    16.9

FPS (higher is better)

Sleeping Dogs

  • Radeon HD 6870
    23.7
  • GeForce GTX 660
    26.9

FPS (higher is better)

Sniper Elite V2

  • Radeon HD 6870
    24
  • GeForce GTX 660
    27.9

FPS (higher is better)

STALKER: Call of Pripyat

  • Radeon HD 6870
    29.7
  • GeForce GTX 660
    40.6

FPS (higher is better)

StarCraft II

  • Radeon HD 6870
    80.7
  • GeForce GTX 660
    109.5

FPS (higher is better)

The Elder Scrolls: Skyrim

  • Radeon HD 6870
    30.4
  • GeForce GTX 660
    42.6

FPS (higher is better)

Total War: Shogun 2

  • Radeon HD 6870
    17
  • GeForce GTX 660
    24.6

FPS (higher is better)

Unigine Heaven 2.0

  • Radeon HD 6870
    18
  • GeForce GTX 660
    30.4

FPS (higher is better)

World of Warcraft: Mists of Pandaria

  • Radeon HD 6870
    37.1
  • GeForce GTX 660
    49.9

FPS (higher is better)

Bioshock Infinite

DX11, Ultra, DDOD, FXAA

  • Radeon HD 6870
    18
  • GeForce GTX 660
    31

FPS (higher is better)