AMD Radeon Pro 5700 vs NVIDIA Tesla K20m Comparison

The AMD Radeon Pro 5700 decisively outperforms the NVIDIA Tesla K20m in every shared benchmark, with the data showing a 69.2% advantage in Geekbench OpenCL and a 57.2% lead in Geekbench Vulkan. Despite the Tesla K20m holding a higher overall percentile rank among all GPUs (64th vs. 62nd), the Radeon Pro 5700’s average benchmark score of 18,189 versus the Tesla’s 19,089 reflects the different benchmark suites each card was tested with, rather than a reversal of their head-to-head results. The Radeon Pro 5700 wins both direct comparisons, making it the clear performance leader in this matchup.

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The single most significant gap between these two cards appears in the Geekbench OpenCL test, where the AMD Radeon Pro 5700 scores 52,787 against the NVIDIA Tesla K20m’s 16,241. This represents a 69.2% delta in favor of AMD, meaning the Radeon Pro 5700 delivers over three times the raw compute throughput in this workload. The OpenCL result is particularly telling because it exercises general-purpose GPU compute, an area where the Tesla K20m was designed to excel as a professional accelerator—yet the newer AMD architecture simply overwhelms it.

The Geekbench Vulkan test shows a similar but slightly narrower margin. The Radeon Pro 5700 posts 51,289 points, while the Tesla K20m manages 21,936, yielding a 57.2% delta. This result confirms that the AMD card’s advantage extends beyond compute-heavy OpenCL tasks into graphics-oriented Vulkan workloads, where the Tesla’s older Kepler architecture struggles to keep pace. The Vulkan score gap is still massive—more than double—but it is proportionally smaller than the OpenCL gap, suggesting the Tesla K20m’s relative weakness is more pronounced in pure compute scenarios.

Looking at the broader benchmark context, the Tesla K20m’s average score of 19,089 places it within 0.2% of the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4050 Mobile and 0.3% of both the AMD Radeon RX 6600 and NVIDIA Quadro K6000, while sitting 0.4% behind the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 780. The Radeon Pro 5700’s average of 18,189 is 0.2% ahead of the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Mobile and 0.5% ahead of the RTX 2060 SUPER, but 1% behind the AMD Radeon RX 460 and 1.1% behind the Intel Arc A770M. These proximity scores illustrate that both cards sit in a competitive mid-range tier when assessed across their full benchmark portfolios, but the direct head-to-head tests leave no ambiguity about which is faster.

Architecture Differences

The two GPUs represent fundamentally different eras of silicon design. The NVIDIA Tesla K20m uses the GK110 chip built on Kepler architecture, manufactured on a 28 nm process at TSMC. It packs 7,080 million transistors into a 561 mm² die, yielding a transistor density of 12.6 million per square millimeter. The AMD Radeon Pro 5700 employs the Navi 10 chip with RDNA 1.0 architecture, also from TSMC but on a dramatically smaller 7 nm process. This newer node allows AMD to cram 10,300 million transistors into just 251 mm², achieving a transistor density of 41.0 million per square millimeter—more than three times the Tesla’s density.

Memory configurations diverge sharply. The Tesla K20m comes with 5 GB of GDDR5 on a 320-bit bus, running at 1300 MHz (5.2 Gbps effective) for a bandwidth of 208.0 GB/s. The Radeon Pro 5700 offers 8 GB of GDDR6 on a 256-bit bus, clocked at 1500 MHz (12 Gbps effective), delivering 384.0 GB/s of bandwidth. The AMD card’s narrower bus is more than compensated by the faster memory technology, giving it an 84.6% bandwidth advantage.

Compute resources tell a nuanced story. The Tesla K20m has more shading units (2,496 vs. 2,304) and more texture mapping units (208 vs. 144), but the Radeon Pro 5700 has more raster operation units (64 vs. 40). The clock speeds shift the balance decisively: the Radeon Pro 5700 has a base clock of 1243 MHz and a boost clock of 1350 MHz, while the Tesla K20m’s clocks are not listed in the data. The result is that the Radeon Pro 5700 achieves 6.221 TFLOPS of FP32 performance and 12.44 TFLOPS of FP16 (2:1), while the Tesla K20m manages only 3.524 TFLOPS of FP32 and has no FP16 capability listed. Pixel rate favors AMD at 86.40 GPixel/s versus 36.71 GPixel/s, and texture rate also favors AMD at 194.4 GTexel/s versus 146.8 GTexel/s.

Power and interface differences are stark. The Tesla K20m draws 225 W TDP, requires a 550 W power supply, and uses 1x 6-pin plus 1x 8-pin connectors, occupying a dual-slot form factor. The Radeon Pro 5700 is rated at just 130 W TDP, needs only a 300 W power supply, uses no external power connectors, and is an IGP (integrated graphics processor) form factor. The Tesla K20m runs on PCIe 2.0 x16, while the Radeon Pro 5700 uses PCIe 4.0 x16. Both cards have no display outputs, reflecting their compute-focused roles.

Where Each One Wins

The AMD Radeon Pro 5700 wins every head-to-head benchmark, so the question is not which card is faster, but where the Tesla K20m’s remaining strengths lie. In the Geekbench OpenCL test, the Radeon Pro 5700’s 52,787 score versus 16,241 for the Tesla K20m indicates that the AMD card is the superior choice for general-purpose compute workloads, including scientific simulations, data processing, and any application that leverages OpenCL acceleration. The 69.2% delta here is the largest in the comparison, making compute the Radeon Pro 5700’s strongest category.

For graphics-oriented workloads measured by Geekbench Vulkan, the Radeon Pro 5700 again dominates with 51,289 points against the Tesla K20m’s 21,936, a 57.2% advantage. This suggests the AMD card is better suited for rendering tasks, game development, and any Vulkan-based visualization work. The Tesla K20m’s only potential advantage lies in its higher percentile ranking (64th vs. 62nd), which reflects its average score across its limited benchmark set—but this does not translate into any direct benchmark win against the Radeon Pro 5700.

The Radeon Pro 5700 also wins on efficiency metrics that matter for deployment. Its 130 W TDP versus 225 W for the Tesla K20m means it generates less heat and requires less cooling, while its IGP form factor and lack of power connectors make it far easier to integrate into systems. The PCIe 4.0 interface doubles the bandwidth of the Tesla’s PCIe 2.0 connection, which can reduce data transfer bottlenecks in memory-intensive applications. For any new deployment, the Radeon Pro 5700 is the rational choice; the Tesla K20m is only relevant in legacy systems where its specific Kepler-era features or 5 GB memory configuration are required.

FAQ

Q: Which card is faster in Geekbench OpenCL?

A: The AMD Radeon Pro 5700 scores 52,787 in Geekbench OpenCL, compared to the NVIDIA Tesla K20m’s 16,241, giving the AMD card a 69.2% advantage.

Q: What is the memory bandwidth difference between the two cards?

A: The Radeon Pro 5700 has 384.0 GB/s of bandwidth from 8 GB of GDDR6 on a 256-bit bus, while the Tesla K20m has 208.0 GB/s from 5 GB of GDDR5 on a 320-bit bus.

Q: How do the FP32 compute performances compare?

A: The Radeon Pro 5700 delivers 6.221 TFLOPS of FP32 performance, while the Tesla K20m provides 3.524 TFLOPS, making the AMD card approximately 76.6% faster in raw FP32 throughput.

Q: Which card has a higher transistor density?

A: The Radeon Pro 5700 achieves 41.0 million transistors per square millimeter on its 7 nm process, versus the Tesla K20m’s 12.6 million per square millimeter on 28 nm.

Q: Are there any benchmark tests where the Tesla K20m wins?

A: No. In the head-to-head benchmark data, the Radeon Pro 5700 wins both the Geekbench OpenCL and Geekbench Vulkan tests, with the Tesla K20m recording zero wins.

Q: What are the power requirements for each card?

A: The Tesla K20m has a 225 W TDP and requires a 550 W power supply with 1x 6-pin and 1x 8-pin connectors, while the Radeon Pro 5700 has a 130 W TDP, needs only a 300 W power supply, and uses no external power connectors.

Specification Differences

| Specification | NVIDIA Tesla K20m | AMD Radeon Pro 5700 |

|---|---|---|

| Architecture | Kepler | RDNA 1.0 |

| Process Node | 28 nm | 7 nm |

| Transistors | 7,080 million | 10,300 million |

| Die Size | 561 mm² | 251 mm² |

| Transistor Density | 12.6M / mm² | 41.0M / mm² |

| Base Clock | Not listed | 1243 MHz |

| Boost Clock | Not listed | 1350 MHz |

| Memory Size | 5 GB | 8 GB |

| Memory Type | GDDR5 | GDDR6 |

| Memory Bus Width | 320 bit | 256 bit |

| Memory Bandwidth | 208.0 GB/s | 384.0 GB/s |

| Shading Units | 2496 | 2304 |

| TMUs | 208 | 144 |

| ROPs | 40 | 64 |

| FP32 Performance | 3.524 TFLOPS | 6.221 TFLOPS |

| FP16 Performance | Not listed | 12.44 TFLOPS (2:1) |

| Pixel Rate | 36.71 GPixel/s | 86.40 GPixel/s |

| Texture Rate | 146.8 GTexel/s | 194.4 GTexel/s |

| TDP | 225 W | 130 W |

| Slot Width | Dual-slot | IGP |

| Power Connectors | 1x 6-pin + 1x 8-pin | None |

| Suggested PSU | 550 W | 300 W |

| Bus Interface | PCIe 2.0 x16 | PCIe 4.0 x16 |

| DirectX Support | 12 (11_0) | 12 (12_1) |

| Vulkan Support | 1.2.175 | 1.4 |

| Release Date | 2013-01-04 | 2020-08-03 |

| Launch MSRP | 3,199 USD | Not listed |

The Verdict

The data is unambiguous: the AMD Radeon Pro 5700 is the superior GPU in every measurable head-to-head comparison. It wins Geekbench OpenCL by 69.2% and Geekbench Vulkan by 57.2%, while also offering more memory (8 GB vs. 5 GB), higher bandwidth (384.0 GB/s vs. 208.0 GB/s), and nearly double the FP32 compute (6.221 TFLOPS vs. 3.524 TFLOPS). The Radeon Pro 5700 achieves this with a 130 W TDP versus 225 W for the Tesla K20m, making it not only faster but also more power-efficient. Its 7 nm process enables a far smaller die (251 mm² vs. 561 mm²) with more transistors (10,300 million vs. 7,080 million), and its PCIe 4.0 interface doubles the bus bandwidth of the Tesla’s PCIe 2.0.

The NVIDIA Tesla K20m’s only statistical advantage is its 64th percentile ranking among all GPUs versus the Radeon Pro 5700’s 62nd, but this stems from its average benchmark score of 19,089 across just two tests, compared to the AMD card’s 18,189 average across ten tests. Neither card has display outputs, so both are purely compute or rendering accelerators, but the Radeon Pro 5700’s IGP form factor and lack of power connectors make it dramatically easier to deploy. The Tesla K20m launched at 3,199 USD in January 2013 and is end-of-life, while the Radeon Pro 5700 arrived in August 2020 with no listed MSRP. Anyone choosing between these two should pick the AMD Radeon Pro 5700 without hesitation, as the Tesla K20m offers no benchmark-verified advantage in any workload. The only reason to select the Tesla K20m would be legacy system compatibility, but the performance data provides no justification for that choice on merit.