AMD Radeon RX 480 vs NVIDIA GRID M60-1Q Comparison

The AMD Radeon RX 480 and NVIDIA GRID M60-1Q represent two fundamentally different approaches to graphics processing, with the former aimed at consumer desktops and the latter at virtualized data center workloads. Despite their divergent target markets, the benchmark data places them in a similar performance tier, though the RX 480 demonstrates a decisive edge in the one test where both were measured. The RX 480’s average benchmark score of 33,997 places it in the 78th percentile of all GPUs, while the GRID M60-1Q’s average of 31,220 sits in the 76th percentile—a narrow gap that belies the architectural chasm between them.

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The only shared benchmark between the two cards is Geekbench Vulkan, and the results are emphatically one-sided. The AMD Radeon RX 480 scores 45,968, while the NVIDIA GRID M60-1Q manages 31,220. That translates to a 47.2% advantage for the RX 480—a massive margin that underscores how effectively AMD’s architecture handles modern low-level graphics APIs. The RX 480 doesn’t just win; it wins by nearly half again the GRID card’s output. In practical terms, this means Vulkan-based gaming or compute workloads would run with substantially higher frame rates or faster execution times on the AMD card.

Contextualizing the GRID M60-1Q’s score against its nearest rivals reveals an interesting quirk. Its 31,220 average is essentially tied with the NVIDIA Quadro M5000 (31,206, deltaPct 0.0) and sits within 0.4% of the GeForce RTX 4070 Ti SUPER (31,087). It also trails the RTX PRO 4500 Blackwell (31,532) by 1% and the TITAN RTX (31,676) by 1.4%. These are surprisingly modern and powerful competitors, yet the GRID card holds its own in raw score terms. However, that parity is misleading—the GRID M60-1Q’s score comes from a single Vulkan test, while the RTX cards have far broader capabilities that these numbers don’t capture.

For the RX 480, its nearest rivals paint a picture of tight clustering. It sits within 0.5% of the RTX A2000 12 GB (34,154), 0.4% of the RX 7700S (33,849), and 0.4% of the RX 560 XT (34,133). The closest comparable is the ancient Radeon HD 7950 (33,951), which trails by a mere 0.1%. This suggests the RX 480 delivers performance that remains competitive with much newer hardware, a signal of its balanced design and efficient GCN 4.0 architecture.

Where Each One Wins

The RX 480 wins the only head-to-head benchmark, giving it a clean sweep with 1 win and 0 losses. That Vulkan victory indicates a clear advantage in scenarios that leverage modern, low-overhead graphics APIs. Gamers running Vulkan titles, developers testing cross-platform applications, or compute users leveraging Vulkan’s flexible pipeline would all see superior results on the RX 480. The card also boasts a far richer feature set for consumer use, including display outputs (1x HDMI 2.0b and 3x DisplayPort 1.4a), which the GRID M60-1Q completely lacks—its specification lists “No outputs.”

The GRID M60-1Q’s strengths lie outside the measured benchmarks. As a virtualization-focused card with no display outputs, its entire purpose is server-side processing for virtual desktops and cloud gaming. Its 64 ROPs (double the RX 480’s 32) and higher pixel rate of 75.39 GPixel/s versus 40.51 GPixel/s suggest it could excel in fill-rate-bound tasks like anti-aliasing or multi-sampled rendering. Its 225 W TDP with an 8-pin connector and 550 W suggested PSU indicates a card designed for sustained server loads, not thermal-constrained consumer cases. In a virtualized environment where multiple users share GPU resources, the GRID card’s architecture may offer better concurrent session handling, though the provided data doesn’t quantify this.

Architecture Differences

The architectural divergence between these two cards is stark. The RX 480 uses AMD’s GCN 4.0 architecture on the Ellesmere chip, fabricated on a 14 nm process at GlobalFoundries. This newer node allows for 5,700 million transistors packed into a 232 mm² die, yielding a transistor density of 24.6M per mm². In contrast, the GRID M60-1Q uses NVIDIA’s Maxwell 2.0 architecture on the GM204 chip, built on TSMC’s 28 nm process. It contains 5,200 million transistors—only slightly fewer—but spread across a much larger 398 mm² die, resulting in a density of just 13.1M per mm². The RX 480’s nearly double transistor density is a direct consequence of the smaller process node and explains how it achieves higher clock speeds and better efficiency.

Clock speeds further separate the two. The RX 480 runs at a base of 1120 MHz and boosts to 1266 MHz, while the GRID M60-1Q has a base of 557 MHz and boosts to 1178 MHz. The RX 480’s higher sustained clocks contribute to its 5.834 TFLOPS of FP32 performance versus the GRID card’s 4.825 TFLOPS. In terms of shading units, the RX 480 has 2304 versus the GRID’s 2048, and it also leads in TMUs with 144 versus 128. However, the GRID M60-1Q counters with 64 ROPs versus the RX 480’s 32, giving it a 2:1 advantage in pixel output. Memory architecture shows parity in bus width (256-bit for both), but the RX 480’s GDDR5 runs at 2000 MHz (8 Gbps effective) versus 1253 MHz (5 Gbps effective), yielding 256.0 GB/s bandwidth versus 160.4 GB/s.

Specification Differences

The most glaring specification difference is memory capacity. The RX 480 comes with 8 GB of GDDR5, while the GRID M60-1Q has just 1024 MB (1 GB). This eightfold difference is critical for modern workloads—8 GB allows for high-resolution textures and large datasets, while 1 GB is severely constrained even for older titles. The RX 480’s FP16 performance matches its FP32 at 5.834 TFLOPS (1:1 ratio), whereas the GRID card lists no FP16 capability at all, limiting its usefulness for AI and machine learning inference tasks.

Power and physical specifications also diverge sharply. The RX 480 has a 150 W TDP with a single 6-pin connector and 450 W suggested PSU, making it far easier to integrate into consumer systems. The GRID M60-1Q draws 225 W, requires an 8-pin connector and 550 W PSU, and measures 267 mm in length (10.5 inches) versus the RX 480’s 240 mm (9.4 inches). Both are dual-slot cards, but the GRID’s lack of display outputs means it’s unusable as a standalone desktop GPU. The RX 480 supports DirectX 12 (12_0), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.3, while the GRID card supports DirectX 12 (12_1), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.4—a minor API version advantage for NVIDIA.

The RX 480 was released on June 28, 2016, with a launch MSRP of 229 USD, while the GRID M60-1Q came out earlier on August 29, 2015. Both are now end-of-life products. The RX 480 has a defined lineage—predecessor Pirate Islands and successor Polaris—while the GRID card has no listed predecessor or successor, reflecting its niche status.

FAQ

Q: Which card performs better in Vulkan benchmarks?

A: The AMD Radeon RX 480 scores 45,968 in Geekbench Vulkan, which is 47.2% higher than the NVIDIA GRID M60-1Q’s 31,220. This represents the only direct benchmark comparison available between the two cards.

Q: How do their average benchmark scores compare?

A: The RX 480 has an average benchmark score of 33,997 across all tests, placing it in the 78th percentile of all GPUs. The GRID M60-1Q averages 31,220, putting it in the 76th percentile. The difference is roughly 8.9% in favor of the RX 480.

Q: What are the key memory capacity and bandwidth differences?

A: The RX 480 features 8 GB of GDDR5 memory with 256.0 GB/s bandwidth, while the GRID M60-1Q has only 1024 MB (1 GB) with 160.4 GB/s bandwidth. Both use a 256-bit memory bus.

Q: Which card has higher pixel fill rate?

A: Despite losing in compute performance, the NVIDIA GRID M60-1Q wins in pixel fill rate with 75.39 GPixel/s, more than double the RX 480’s 40.51 GPixel/s. This comes from its 64 ROPs versus the RX 480’s 32.

Q: Do these cards have different power requirements?

A: Yes, the RX 480 has a 150 W TDP with a single 6-pin connector and 450 W suggested PSU, while the GRID M60-1Q has a 225 W TDP, requires an 8-pin connector, and suggests a 550 W PSU.

Q: What are the process node and transistor density differences?

A: The RX 480 is built on a 14 nm process at GlobalFoundries with 5,700 million transistors on a 232 mm² die (24.6M per mm²). The GRID M60-1Q uses TSMC’s 28 nm process with 5,200 million transistors on a 398 mm² die (13.1M per mm²).