NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970M vs ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3870

Comparative analysis of NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970M and ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3870 videocards for all known characteristics in the following categories: Essentials, Technical info, Video outputs and ports, Compatibility, dimensions and requirements, API support, Memory, Technologies. Benchmark videocards performance analysis: PassMark - G3D Mark, PassMark - G2D Mark, Geekbench - OpenCL, CompuBench 1.5 Desktop - Face Detection (mPixels/s), CompuBench 1.5 Desktop - Ocean Surface Simulation (Frames/s), CompuBench 1.5 Desktop - T-Rex (Frames/s), CompuBench 1.5 Desktop - Video Composition (Frames/s), CompuBench 1.5 Desktop - Bitcoin Mining (mHash/s), GFXBench 4.0 - Car Chase Offscreen (Frames), GFXBench 4.0 - Manhattan (Frames), GFXBench 4.0 - T-Rex (Frames), GFXBench 4.0 - Car Chase Offscreen (Fps), GFXBench 4.0 - Manhattan (Fps), GFXBench 4.0 - T-Rex (Fps), 3DMark Fire Strike - Graphics Score.

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970M

ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3870

Differences

Reasons to consider the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970M

Videocard is newer: launch date 6 year(s) 4 month(s) later
Around 40% higher core clock speed: 924 MHz vs 660 MHz
7.9x more texture fill rate: 83.04 GTexel / s vs 10.56 GTexel / s
4x more pipelines: 1280 vs 320
6.3x better floating-point performance: 2,657 gflops vs 422.4 gflops
A newer manufacturing process allows for a more powerful, yet cooler running videocard: 28 nm vs 55 nm
12x more maximum memory size: 6 GB vs 512 MB
Around 47% higher memory clock speed: 2500 MHz vs 1700 MHz
10.4x better performance in PassMark - G3D Mark: 5691 vs 548
Around 31% better performance in PassMark - G2D Mark: 378 vs 288

Specifications (specs)
Launch date	7 October 2014 vs 4 June 2008
Core clock speed	924 MHz vs 660 MHz
Texture fill rate	83.04 GTexel / s vs 10.56 GTexel / s
Pipelines	1280 vs 320
Floating-point performance	2,657 gflops vs 422.4 gflops
Manufacturing process technology	28 nm vs 55 nm
Maximum memory size	6 GB vs 512 MB
Memory clock speed	2500 MHz vs 1700 MHz
Benchmarks
PassMark - G3D Mark	5691 vs 548
PassMark - G2D Mark	378 vs 288

Reasons to consider the ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3870

Around 47% lower typical power consumption: 55 Watt vs 81 Watt

Thermal Design Power (TDP)	55 Watt vs 81 Watt

Compare benchmarks

GPU 1: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970M
GPU 2: ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3870

PassMark - G3D Mark

GPU 1

GPU 2

5691

548

PassMark - G2D Mark

GPU 1

GPU 2

378

288

Name	NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970M	ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3870
PassMark - G3D Mark	5691	548
PassMark - G2D Mark	378	288
Geekbench - OpenCL	19001
CompuBench 1.5 Desktop - Face Detection (mPixels/s)	59.428
CompuBench 1.5 Desktop - Ocean Surface Simulation (Frames/s)	1113.788
CompuBench 1.5 Desktop - T-Rex (Frames/s)	4.157
CompuBench 1.5 Desktop - Video Composition (Frames/s)	39.101
CompuBench 1.5 Desktop - Bitcoin Mining (mHash/s)	81.909
GFXBench 4.0 - Car Chase Offscreen (Frames)	8546
GFXBench 4.0 - Manhattan (Frames)	3699
GFXBench 4.0 - T-Rex (Frames)	3342
GFXBench 4.0 - Car Chase Offscreen (Fps)	8546
GFXBench 4.0 - Manhattan (Fps)	3699
GFXBench 4.0 - T-Rex (Fps)	3342
3DMark Fire Strike - Graphics Score	472

Compare specifications (specs)

	NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970M	ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3870
Essentials
Architecture	Maxwell 2.0	TeraScale
Code name	GM204	M88
Launch date	7 October 2014	4 June 2008
Launch price (MSRP)	$2,560.89
Place in performance rating	568	565
Price now	$1,899
Type	Laptop	Laptop
Value for money (0-100)	3.99
Technical info
Boost clock speed	1038 MHz
Core clock speed	924 MHz	660 MHz
CUDA cores	1280
Floating-point performance	2,657 gflops	422.4 gflops
Manufacturing process technology	28 nm	55 nm
Pipelines	1280	320
Texture fill rate	83.04 GTexel / s	10.56 GTexel / s
Thermal Design Power (TDP)	81 Watt	55 Watt
Transistor count	5,200 million	666 million
Video outputs and ports
Display Connectors	No outputs	No outputs
DisplayPort Multimode (DP++) support	1
G-SYNC support
HDMI
VGA аnalog display support	1
Compatibility, dimensions and requirements
Bus support	PCI Express 3.0
Interface	MXM-B (3.0)	PCIe 2.0 x16
Laptop size	large	large
SLI options	1
Supplementary power connectors	None
API support
DirectX	12.0 (12_1)	10.1
OpenCL	1.1
OpenGL	4.5	3.3
Memory
Maximum RAM amount	6 GB	512 MB
Memory bandwidth	120 GB / s	54.4 GB / s
Memory bus width	192 Bit	256 Bit
Memory clock speed	2500 MHz	1700 MHz
Memory type	GDDR5	GDDR3
Shared memory	0	0
Technologies
Ansel
BatteryBoost
CUDA
DSR
GameStream
GameWorks
GeForce Experience
GeForce ShadowPlay
GPU Boost
H.264, VC1, MPEG2 1080p video decoder
Optimus
SLI
PowerPlay 7.0