GPU Comparison

The AMD Radeon RX 470 wins this comparison decisively, taking both head-to-head benchmark contests with margins approaching half again the FirePro W7100's score. The recorded data shows the consumer Polis-card ahead by 38.8% in Geekbench OpenCL and 44.9% in Geekbench Vulkan, while carrying a lower thermal envelope and a more modern feature set. The W7100's case rests on its professional heritage and doubled memory capacity, not on raw throughput.

FAQ

Q: Which GPU is faster overall?

A: The Radeon RX 470. Its average benchmark score in the database is 28,996 versus 25,856 for the FirePro W7100, and it wins both shared head-to-head tests by 38.8% (OpenCL) and 44.9% (Vulkan).

Q: How do they rank against the full GPU database?

A: The RX 470 sits in the 74th percentile of all GPUs; the W7100 sits in the 71st percentile. Both are end-of-life parts.

Q: Which card has more memory?

A: The FirePro W7100, with 8 GB of GDDR5 on a 256-bit bus. The RX 470 has 4 GB of GDDR5 on the same bus width.

Q: Which card is more power efficient?

A: On paper, the RX 470. Its TDP is 120 W against the W7100's 150 W, and its suggested PSU is 300 W versus 450 W. Both use a single 6-pin connector.

Q: What process nodes do they use?

A: The RX 470 is built on GlobalFoundries' 14 nm process; the W7100 uses TSMC's 28 nm process.

Q: Which is newer?

A: The RX 470, released on August 3, 2016. The W7100 launched on August 11, 2014.

Architecture Differences

These cards belong to different eras of AMD's Graphics Core Next lineage. The RX 470 is the Ellesmere chip on GCN 4.0, part of the Arctic Islands (RX 400) generation, while the W7100 is the Tonga chip on GCN 3.0 from the FirePro GCN (Wx100) professional line. The two-generation gap shows up everywhere in the spec sheet.

The manufacturing advantage is the foundation of the RX 470's lead. Its 14 nm GlobalFoundries node yields 5,700 million transistors in a 232 mm² die, a density of 24.6M per mm². The W7100's 28 nm TSMC process packs 5,000 million transistors into a much larger 366 mm² die, at 13.7M per mm². Nearly twice the density lets the RX 470 do more with less silicon, and that efficiency carries through to power: 120 W TDP against 150 W.

Compute resources follow the same pattern. The RX 470 fields 2048 shading units and 128 TMUs, against 1792 and 112 on the W7100. Both share 32 ROPs and a 256-bit memory bus, but the RX 470's memory runs at 6.6 Gbps effective for 211.2 GB/s of bandwidth, while the W7100's 5 Gbps effective yields 160.0 GB/s. The result is a peak FP32 throughput of 4.940 TFLOPS on the RX 470 versus 3.297 TFLOPS on the W7100, a gap of roughly fifty percent. Both handle FP16 at a 1:1 ratio with FP32, so the advantage scales identically in half-precision workloads.

Feature support also favors the newer card. The RX 470 offers Vulkan 1.3, HDMI 2.0b, and three DisplayPort 1.4a outputs alongside one HDMI port. The W7100 stops at Vulkan 1.2.170 and four DisplayPort 1.2 connections with no HDMI at all, a quad-DP arrangement aimed at professional multi-monitor setups rather than living rooms. Both support DirectX 12 (12_0) and OpenGL 4.6.

The one architectural trade-off that cuts the other way is capacity: 8 GB versus 4 GB of GDDR5. For workloads that genuinely fit only in the larger buffer, the W7100 can complete jobs the RX 470 cannot.

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The shared test suite is small but lopsided. Every head-to-head result belongs to the RX 470, and the margins are large.

Geekbench OpenCL: the RX 470 scores 33,568 against the W7100's 24,182, a 38.8% victory. This compute-oriented test plays directly to the RX 470's shading-unit and clock advantages, and the database shows the gap is not marginal, it is a blowout.

Geekbench Vulkan: the RX 470 posts 39,884 versus 27,529 for the W7100, a 44.9% win. The newer Vulkan driver support compounds the hardware advantage here, and the RX 470 nearly touches a score fifty percent higher.

The RX 470's individual results reinforce the picture. Beyond the two shared tests, it records 41,690 in Geekbench Metal and 842 in 3DMark Steel Nomad (DX12). Its average benchmark score of 28,996 places it in a scrum of near-equals: the Radeon RX 6800M sits within 0.4%, the Intel Arc A370M within 0.6%, the RX Vega M GH within 0.7%, and the FirePro W8000 within 0.7%. In other words, the RX 470 performs in the company of those rivals while beating the W7100 outright.

The W7100's average of 25,856 puts it alongside the FirePro D700 (0.1% delta), the Radeon R9 M395X (0.1%), the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti Mobile (0.5%), and the Radeon Pro W5700 (0.5%). That cluster is respectable, but it sits clearly below where the RX 470 lands, and the percentile figures, 74 versus 71, confirm the same ordering against the database at large. The W7100 simply has no recorded win in this matchup.

Specification Differences

Only the fields where the two cards differ:

• Chip: Ellesmere (RX 470) vs Tonga (W7100)
• Architecture: GCN 4.0 vs GCN 3.0
• Generation: Arctic Islands (RX 400) vs FirePro GCN (Wx100)
• Process node: 14 nm GlobalFoundries vs 28 nm TSMC
• Transistors: 5,700 million vs 5,000 million
• Die size: 232 mm² vs 366 mm²
• Transistor density: 24.6M/mm² vs 13.7M/mm²
• Clocks: RX 470 runs 926 MHz base and 1206 MHz boost; no base or boost clock is recorded for the W7100. Memory runs at 1650 MHz (6.6 Gbps effective) vs 1250 MHz (5 Gbps effective).
• Memory size: 4 GB vs 8 GB GDDR5 (both 256-bit; bandwidth 211.2 vs 160.0 GB/s)
• Shading units: 2048 vs 1792
• TMUs: 128 vs 112
• ROPs: 32 on both, unchanged
• Pixel rate: 38.59 vs 29.44 GPixel/s
• Texture rate: 154.4 vs 103.0 GTexel/s
• FP32/FP16: 4.940 vs 3.297 TFLOPS (both 1:1 FP16)
• TDP: 120 W vs 150 W
• Slot width: Dual-slot vs single-slot
• Suggested PSU: 300 W vs 450 W
• Power connector: both 1x 6-pin
• Bus: both PCIe 3.0 x16
• Outputs: 1x HDMI 2.0b plus 3x DisplayPort 1.4a vs 4x DisplayPort 1.2
• Vulkan: 1.3 vs 1.2.170 (DirectX and OpenGL identical)
• Dimensions: 240 x 95 x 35 mm vs 241 x 111 mm (width unrecorded)
• Release: 2016-08-03 vs 2014-08-11
• Predecessor/successor: Pirate Islands and Polaris vs FirePro Terascale and Radeon Pro Polaris
• Launch MSRP: the RX 470 carried a launch MSRP of 179 USD; no launch MSRP is recorded for the W7100.

Where Each One Wins

The RX 470 wins every performance category the database measures. OpenCL compute, Vulkan rendering, pixel fill (38.59 vs 29.44 GPixel/s), texture fill (154.4 vs 103.0 GTexel/s), memory bandwidth, and raw TFLOPS all fall its way, and it does so while drawing less power and requiring a smaller PSU recommendation. For gaming at DirectX 12 and Vulkan, GPU compute workloads, and any throughput-bound task, the data points one direction. Its newer API support (Vulkan 1.3, DisplayPort 1.4a, HDMI 2.0b) also makes it the better fit for modern display and driver environments.

The W7100 wins on three practical fronts. First, memory capacity: 8 GB doubles the RX 470's buffer, which matters for datasets and scenes that exceed 4 GB. Second, form factor: it is a single-slot card, fitting where the dual-slot RX 470 cannot, though it is slightly longer and notably taller in the recorded dimensions. Third, connectivity: four DisplayPort 1.2 outputs serve multi-monitor professional desks directly, where the RX 470 offers three DisplayPort plus one HDMI.

Neither card wins on power: the W7100 draws more despite delivering less, though both share the same 1x 6-pin connector and PCIe 3.0 x16 interface.

The Verdict

For nearly every buyer the data can describe, the Radeon RX 470 is the correct pick. It is faster in every recorded head-to-head benchmark, by 38.8% in OpenCL and 44.9% in Vulkan, it delivers substantially higher fill rates and compute throughput, it supports newer APIs and display standards, and it does all of this at a lower TDP and a lower suggested PSU rating. The database ranks it in the 74th percentile against 71st for the W7100, and their rival clusters do not overlap in the W7100's favor.

Choose the FirePro W7100 only if its specific strengths align with the workload: workloads requiring more than 4 GB of GDDR5, chassis constrained to a single-slot card, or desks needing four DisplayPort 1.2 monitors from one card. Its professional lineage and Radeon Pro Polaris successor line underscore that it was built for workstation duty, not for benchmark dominance. As a pure performer, the RX 470 wins this matchup without a single recorded contest going the other way.