How to compare graphics cards by reading the specs?

Hi,

Please don't answer by saying look at benchmarks, that's really not what I'm looking for.

What I want to know is. How can you tell how good it is by looking at the specs?

I used to compare the fillrates... the higher the fillrate, the better the card but I'm starting to understand that technically, fillrate doesn't always relate to the cards performance. How can a card with a lower fillrate be a better performer than a card with a lower fillrate? It's true because you can see it in benchmarks.

So, what I'm asking is, please could somebody explain how to tell which cards are good?

For example:

Gfx card 1 has 500mhz core, 1000mhz shader and 1000mhz memory.. it has a fillrate of 2gt/s..
Gfx card 2 has 600mhz core, 1200mhz shader and 1200mhz memory.. it has a fillrate of 1.6gt/s..

How can card 1 have a better fillrate??? Surely card 2 would have a better fillrate as its specs are higher?

Also that brings me onto benchmarks... card 2 may perform better in benchmarks..

I just don't understand it.

Please can anyone explain how you can determine how good a card is by reading the specs.. just for the sake of being able to compare them???

Cheers!

 

To be honest I think most cards have so many aspects to consider from a spec point of view it's pretty hard to actually figure it out-as long as the Mhz and MB stats look reasonable, it's supported by your existing hardware with sufficient shader support and you're not planning on playing anything massively resource-intensive you should be fine.

 

Hey Eve1980,
the technical specs on a card can be misleading. core clock, memory clock, and memory bandwidth aren't straight forward ratings. much of it depends on which graphics core you are actually using.

From my experience, memory bandwidth is a big factor in overall performance. However, because so many variables can influence the end results, the best way to compare cards is simply by benchmarking them online

 

Don't mess up with specification. no result you get only headache.

First of all make your mind for which purpose you need it. And check the benchmarking for choose one from multiple cards. According that you save you time as well as your pocket too.

 

Don't bother reading the specs, use a website like videocardbenchmarks (google it) - You can see all the comparisons without reading the specs - Only thing left to do is choose a brand

If you really want to read the specs - Generally a higher core followed by a higher memory core is what you are looking at, then memory type and size