AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT vs NVIDIA Tesla K40m Comparison

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The database contains one directly comparable benchmark result between these two cards, and the outcome is not close. In the Geekbench OpenCL test, the AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT scores 138,383 points, while the NVIDIA Tesla K40m manages only 19,885 points. That is a 595.9% advantage for the AMD card in raw compute performance. To put that in perspective, the RX 7700 XT delivers over seven times the OpenCL throughput of the Tesla K40m. This is the kind of generational gap you would expect when comparing a 2023 enthusiast GPU against a 2013 compute card, and the recorded data fully supports that expectation.

The AMD card's average benchmark score of 22,549 places it at the 67th percentile of all GPUs in the database. Its nearest rivals in the overall rankings are the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 Mobile at 22,435 (0.5% faster), the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 Mobile at 22,729 (0.8% slower), the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 at 22,895 (1.5% slower), and the AMD Radeon RX 5700 at 22,170 (1.7% faster). The RX 7700 XT sits in a tightly packed cluster where none of these competitors are more than 1.7% away, meaning it trades blows with a range of desktop and mobile GPUs from several generations.

The Tesla K40m, by contrast, has an average benchmark score of 19,885, which lands it at the 65th percentile. Its nearest rivals include the AMD FirePro W7000 at 19,905 (0.1% slower), the AMD Radeon RX 6650 XT at 19,765 (0.6% faster), the AMD FirePro D300 at 19,637 (1.3% faster), and the NVIDIA Quadro K5200 at 19,602 (1.4% faster). The K40m is effectively at parity with these workstation and midrange cards, which is remarkable for a GPU that launched with a 7,699 USD MSRP. The data shows the K40m still holds its own against much newer hardware in raw OpenCL compute, but it does so from a much lower absolute performance level.

FAQ

Q: Which card is faster in OpenCL compute?

A: The AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT is dramatically faster. Its Geekbench OpenCL score of 138,383 is 595.9% higher than the Tesla K40m's 19,885.

Q: Do both cards have the same memory capacity?

A: Yes, both cards feature 12 GB of VRAM. However, the RX 7700 XT uses GDDR6 memory on a 192-bit bus with 432.0 GB/s of bandwidth, while the K40m uses GDDR5 on a 384-bit bus with 288.4 GB/s.

Q: What are the power requirements of these cards?

A: Both cards have a 245 W TDP and a suggested power supply rating of 550 W. The RX 7700 XT uses two 8-pin power connectors, while the K40m has no power connector information recorded in the database.

Q: Which card has better API support?

A: The RX 7700 XT supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.4. The K40m supports DirectX 12 (11_1), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.2.175. The AMD card has a higher DirectX feature level and a newer Vulkan version.

Q: Are both cards the same physical length?

A: Yes, both are 267 mm or 10.5 inches long and dual-slot designs. The RX 7700 XT also has recorded dimensions of 135 mm height and 50 mm width, while the K40m does not have height or width data in the database.

Q: Which card is still in production?

A: The AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT is listed as Active production, while the NVIDIA Tesla K40m is End-of-life. The RX 7700 XT was released on 2023-09-05, and the K40m was released on 2013-11-21.

Q: How do these cards rank against other GPUs?

A: The RX 7700 XT is at the 67th percentile of all GPUs with an average benchmark score of 22,549. The Tesla K40m is at the 65th percentile with an average benchmark score of 19,885. Despite the K40m's lower absolute scores, the percentile difference is only two percentile points apart in the overall rankings.

Architecture Differences

The AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT is built on the RDNA 3.0 architecture using the Navi 32 chip on a 5 nm process node fabricated by TSMC. The chip contains 28,100 million transistors packed into a 346 mm² die size, giving a transistor density of 81.2M per mm². The chip is codenamed Wheat Nas, and it belongs to the Navi III (RX 7000) generation. It includes 54 ray tracing acceleration cores, a feature that the Tesla K40m completely lacks, which is a significant architectural divergence between a modern gaming architecture and a compute-oriented Kepler part.

The NVIDIA Tesla K40m uses the Kepler architecture with the GK110B chip on a 28 nm process, also fabricated by TSMC. This chip contains 7,080 million transistors on a much larger 561 mm² die, resulting in a transistor density of only 12.6M per mm². The K40m belongs to the Tesla Kepler (Kxx) generation, following Tesla Fermi and preceding Tesla Maxwell. The architectural lineage is entirely different: the RX 7700 XT is a modern graphics-first design with dedicated ray tracing hardware, while the K40m is a compute-first GPU from a decade earlier with no ray tracing capability at all.

The process node difference is stark: 5 nm versus 28 nm. This explains how the RX 7700 XT fits 28,100 million transistors onto a 346 mm² die, while the K40m needs 561 mm² to hold just 7,080 million. The RX 7700 XT also supports PCIe 4.0 x16, whereas the K40m uses PCIe 3.0 x16. The display output situation is similarly divergent: the RX 7700 XT has 1x HDMI 2.1a, 2x DisplayPort 2.1, and 1x USB Type-C, while the K40m has no display outputs at all, reflecting its intended role as a compute accelerator rather than a graphics card.

Specification Differences

The core specifications show a clear generational divide. The RX 7700 XT has 3,456 shading units, 216 texture mapping units, and 96 raster operation pipelines, plus 54 ray tracing cores. The K40m has 2,880 shading units, 240 TMUs, and only 48 ROPs, with no ray tracing cores. The shading unit count favors the AMD card, but the K40m actually has more TMUs, which is an interesting reversal given the age difference.

Clock speeds heavily favor the RX 7700 XT. The AMD card has a base clock of 1435 MHz, a boost clock of 2544 MHz, and a game clock of 2171 MHz. The K40m runs at a base clock of 745 MHz and a boost clock of 876 MHz. Memory clocks also differ: the RX 7700 XT runs its GDDR6 at 2250 MHz or 18 Gbps effective, while the K40m runs its GDDR5 at 1502 MHz or 6 Gbps effective.

The resulting throughput figures are far apart. The RX 7700 XT achieves 244.2 GPixel/s pixel rate, 549.5 GTexel/s texture rate, and 35.17 TFLOPS FP32. The K40m achieves 52.56 GPixel/s, 210.2 GTexel/s, and 5.046 TFLOPS FP32. The AMD card also has 35.17 TFLOPS FP16 (1:1 ratio), while the K40m has no recorded FP16 performance. Memory bandwidth favors the RX 7700 XT at 432.0 GB/s versus 288.4 GB/s, even though the K40m has a wider 384-bit bus compared to the RX 7700 XT's 192-bit bus. The faster memory technology on the AMD card overcomes the narrower bus.

The RX 7700 XT was released on 2023-09-05 with a launch MSRP of 449 USD. The Tesla K40m was released on 2013-11-21 with a launch MSRP of 7,699 USD. The RX 7700 XT is dual-slot with 2x 8-pin power connectors, while the K40m is also dual-slot but has no power connector data recorded. Both cards share a 245 W TDP and 550 W suggested power supply. The bus interface differs: PCIe 4.0 x16 on the AMD card versus PCIe 3.0 x16 on the NVIDIA card. Both cards are 267 mm or 10.5 inches in length.

The Verdict

The data points to a straightforward conclusion: the AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT is the superior GPU in nearly every measurable way. Its Geekbench OpenCL score of 138,383 is 595.9% higher than the Tesla K40m's 19,885, and its FP32 throughput of 35.17 TFLOPS dwarfs the K40m's 5.046 TFLOPS. The RX 7700 XT has faster memory, higher clocks, more shading units, more ROPs, ray tracing support, and a much newer architecture on a far more advanced process node. The only specification where the K40m wins is TMU count (240 versus 216) and memory bus width (384-bit versus 192-bit), but neither advantage translates into a benchmark victory.

For anyone building a system today, the RX 7700 XT is the obvious choice. It is an active product with modern API support, display outputs, and a 67th percentile ranking. The Tesla K40m is end-of-life, has no display outputs, and sits at the 65th percentile despite its compute heritage. The K40m was once a professional compute card with a 7,699 USD launch MSRP, but the RX 7700 XT outperforms it by an enormous margin at a fraction of that launch price. The recorded data does not support any scenario where the K40m is the better purchase, unless a specific use case requires its particular Kepler-era compute characteristics.

Where Each One Wins

The AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT wins in every category with recorded data. It wins in OpenCL compute by a 595.9% margin. It wins in FP32 throughput with 35.17 TFLOPS versus 5.046 TFLOPS. It wins in pixel rate with 244.2 GPixel/s versus 52.56 GPixel/s. It wins in texture rate with 549.5 GTexel/s versus 210.2 GTexel/s. It wins in memory bandwidth with 432.0 GB/s versus 288.4 GB/s. It wins in clock speeds at every measured point: base, boost, and memory. It wins in shading units, ROPs, and adds ray tracing cores that the K40m does not have. It wins in API support with DirectX 12 Ultimate versus DirectX 12 (11_1), and Vulkan 1.4 versus Vulkan 1.2.175. It wins in production status as an active product.

The NVIDIA Tesla K40m has no benchmark wins in the database. There is exactly one head-to-head benchmark recorded, and the RX 40m wins none of them. The K40m does have advantages in a few narrow specification fields: 240 TMUs versus 216, a 384-bit memory bus versus 192-bit, and a larger die size at 561 mm² versus 346 mm². These do not translate into performance wins in any recorded test. The K40m's 12 GB of GDDR5 memory matches the RX 7700 XT's 12 GB capacity, so memory size is not a differentiator.

For gaming workloads on a modern desktop, the RX 7700 XT is the only viable option because the K40m has no display outputs and does not support the latest DirectX feature levels. For pure compute workloads, the RX 7700 XT is still the better choice based on every recorded metric. The K40m's place in the database is as a historical data point showing where GPU compute performance stood in 2013, not as a current recommendation. The RX 7700 XT represents the current state of GPU capability, and the numbers show that a modern midrange card can outperform a professional compute card from a decade earlier by a massive margin.