AMD Radeon HD 8950M vs NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080 Comparison

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The recorded comparison between the AMD Radeon HD 8950M and the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080 is limited to two benchmark entries, and the outcome is unambiguous: the GTX 1080 wins both tests. The most severe gap appears in Geekbench OpenCL, where the GTX 1080 scores 51,204 against the HD 8950M’s 13,772. That is a delta of -73.1% for the AMD part, meaning the NVIDIA GPU delivers roughly 3.7 times the compute throughput in this workload. The margin is smaller but still decisive in Geekbench Vulkan, with the GTX 1080 at 30,398 versus 12,979 for the HD 8950M, a -57.3% delta. In practical terms, the GTX 1080 more than doubles the AMD mobile GPU’s Vulkan result.

These are not close contests, and the percentile data reinforces the chasm. The HD 8950M sits at the 54th percentile among all GPUs, while the GTX 1080 sits at the 51st percentile, which seems counterintuitive at first glance. The explanation lies in the average benchmark scores: the HD 8950M averages 13,376 across its two recorded tests, while the GTX 1080 averages 11,960 across eleven tests, many of which are legacy DirectX and compute workloads that drag its mean downward. The head-to-head tests, however, are the more reliable comparison for these two specific parts, and they show a clear hierarchy.

Looking at the nearest rivals in the database, the HD 8950M’s average score places it within 0.4% of the AMD Radeon Pro 555X (13,321), within 0.2% of the AMD Radeon RX 5500M (13,356) and AMD FirePro M6100 (13,354), and -0.2% relative to the AMD Radeon Pro 555 (13,407). The GTX 1080, by contrast, sits slightly above the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 960A (11,998, -0.3% delta) and ahead of the AMD Radeon RX 6500 XT (11,842, +1%), the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 (11,680, +2.4%), and the AMD Radeon RX 7800 XT (11,627, +2.9%) in terms of average score. The GTX 1080’s average is dragged down by its Passmark DirectX 12 score of 55 and DirectX 10 score of 93, which are outlier low entries relative to its OpenCL and Vulkan results.

The head-to-head data is sparse, but the conclusion is consistent: the GTX 1080 is the faster GPU by a wide margin in both shared tests. There is no recorded benchmark where the HD 8950M wins, and the wins tally confirms this at 0 wins for AMD and 2 wins for NVIDIA.

Where Each One Wins

Given the benchmark results, the use-case split is heavily skewed toward the GTX 1080. In compute-oriented OpenCL workloads, the GTX 1080’s 51,204 score represents a 73.1% advantage over the HD 8950M. This translates to tasks like general-purpose GPU compute, physics simulation, and any application that can leverage OpenCL for acceleration. The GTX 1080’s Vulkan result of 30,398 is similarly dominant, with a 57.3% lead, making it the stronger choice for Vulkan-based games and modern rendering APIs that take advantage of that interface.

The HD 8950M does not win any recorded category, but its profile suggests where it might still be relevant. Its average benchmark score of 13,376 is competitive with other mid-range mobile parts from its era, and its OpenCL result of 13,772 is close to its Vulkan score of 12,979, indicating a balanced compute capability across those two APIs. For legacy applications or older DirectX titles, the HD 8950M may hold up acceptably, but the database does not include any DirectX tests for this part to confirm that. The GTX 1080, on the other hand, has a full suite of Passmark DirectX entries: DirectX 9 at 211, DirectX 10 at 93, DirectX 11 at 124, and DirectX 12 at 55. These numbers show that the GTX 1080 is strongest in older DirectX 9 workloads and weakest in DirectX 12, but even its lowest score in that group (55) does not translate to a win for the HD 8950M because no comparable AMD DirectX scores exist in the database.

In terms of GPU compute specifically, the GTX 1080’s Passmark GPU Compute score of 7,614 is another data point, but again there is no matching HD 8950M entry. The practical takeaway is straightforward: for modern compute and Vulkan rendering, the GTX 1080 is the clear winner, while the HD 8950M offers no recorded advantage in any benchmark category.

FAQ

Q: Which GPU has a higher average benchmark score?

A: The AMD Radeon HD 8950M has a higher average score at 13,376, compared to the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080’s 11,960. However, this is influenced by the fact that the GTX 1080 has eleven recorded benchmarks, including several low DirectX scores, while the HD 8950M has only two.

Q: What is the performance gap in Geekbench OpenCL?

A: The GTX 1080 scores 51,204 compared to the HD 8950M’s 13,772, which is a -73.1% delta. This means the GTX 1080 is roughly 3.7 times faster in this specific test.

Q: How do the two GPUs compare in Vulkan performance?

A: In Geekbench Vulkan, the GTX 1080 records 30,398 against 12,979 for the HD 8950M, a -57.3% delta. The GTX 1080 more than doubles the AMD part’s score.

Q: What are the closest rivals to each GPU by average score?

A: The HD 8950M’s nearest rival is the AMD Radeon Pro 555X at 13,321, with a 0.4% delta. The GTX 1080’s nearest rival is the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 960A at 11,998, with a -0.3% delta.

Q: Which GPU has more recorded benchmark wins?

A: The GTX 1080 wins both head-to-head benchmarks. The HD 8950M has zero recorded wins.

Q: Does the GTX 1080 have a higher percentile rank than the HD 8950M?

A: No, the HD 8950M is at the 54th percentile, while the GTX 1080 is at the 51st percentile. The higher average score for the AMD part is the reason for this discrepancy.

Specification Differences

The two GPUs differ substantially across nearly every specification. The memory configuration is a major divergence: the HD 8950M has 2 GB of GDDR5 on a 128-bit bus with 88.00 GB/s bandwidth, while the GTX 1080 has 8 GB of GDDR5X on a 256-bit bus with 320.3 GB/s bandwidth. The GTX 1080 also has a higher effective memory speed at 10 Gbps versus 5.5 Gbps, and a higher memory clock at 1251 MHz versus 1375 MHz for the AMD part. Notably, the HD 8950M’s memory clock is higher in MHz, but the GTX 1080’s GDDR5X technology yields far greater effective bandwidth.

The compute resources are also starkly different. The HD 8950M has 768 shading units, 48 texture mapping units, and 16 raster output units. The GTX 1080 has 2,560 shading units, 160 TMUs, and 64 ROPs. Pixel rate and texture rate follow the same pattern: the GTX 1080 achieves 110.9 GPixel/s and 277.3 GTexel/s, while the HD 8950M manages 17.20 GPixel/s and 51.60 GTexel/s. Floating-point performance (FP32) is 8.873 TFLOPS for the GTX 1080 versus 1.651 TFLOPS for the HD 8950M, and the GTX 1080 also has a recorded FP16 figure of 138.6 GFLOPS (1:64), which the HD 8950M lacks entirely.

Power and physical specs differ as well. The HD 8950M is rated at 100 W TDP and uses an MXM Module slot width, while the GTX 1080 is rated at 180 W TDP, uses a dual-slot design, requires a 1x 8-pin power connector, and lists a suggested PSU of 450 W. The GTX 1080 also has published dimensions of 267 mm length, 112 mm height, and 40 mm width, while the HD 8950M has no recorded dimensions. The bus interface is identical at PCIe 3.0 x16, but display outputs differ: the HD 8950M is marked as portable device dependent, while the GTX 1080 offers 1x DVI, 1x HDMI 2.0, and 3x DisplayPort 1.4a.

Architecture Differences

Architecturally, these are two very different designs. The HD 8950M uses the Saturn chip with AMD’s GCN 2.0 architecture, part of the Solar System generation (HD 8900M series). The GTX 1080 uses the GP104 chip with NVIDIA’s Pascal architecture, part of the GeForce 10-series. The process nodes reflect their release timing: the HD 8950M uses a 28 nm process at TSMC, while the GTX 1080 uses a 16 nm process, also at TSMC. The HD 8950M packs 2,080 million transistors on a 160 mm² die, giving a transistor density of 13.0M per mm². The GTX 1080 contains 7,200 million transistors on a 314 mm² die, with a density of 22.9M per mm². The GTX 1080 thus has more than three times as many transistors on a die that is roughly twice the size, with a higher density.

The cache hierarchy and specialized cores also differ. The HD 8950M has no recorded RT cores or tensor cores, and the GTX 1080 also has none, so neither supports hardware ray tracing or tensor acceleration. The API support is similar but not identical. Both support DirectX 12 and OpenGL 4.6, but the HD 8950M supports DirectX 12 (12_0) while the GTX 1080 supports DirectX 12 (12_1), indicating a higher feature level. Vulkan support also differs: the HD 8950M supports Vulkan 1.2.170, while the GTX 1080 supports a newer Vulkan 1.4.

The release timeline explains some of these gaps. The HD 8950M launched on May 13, 2013, with a predecessor named London and a successor called Gem System. The GTX 1080 launched on May 26, 2016, with a predecessor of GeForce 900 and a successor of GeForce 20. Both are now end-of-life products. The HD 8950M has no launch MSRP recorded, while the GTX 1080 has a launch MSRP of 599 USD. The GTX 1080’s FP16 support at 138.6 GFLOPS (1:64) is a notable architectural feature absent from the HD 8950M’s spec sheet, and the GDDR5X memory type on the GTX 1080 is a generation ahead of the HD 8950M’s GDDR5. In summary, the GTX 1080 is a newer, larger, more capable architecture on a more advanced process node, with superior memory bandwidth, compute throughput, and API feature support. The HD 8950M is a smaller, older mobile GPU that was competitive in its time but is outclassed by the Pascal flagship in every recorded metric.