AMD Radeon RX 9060 vs NVIDIA Tesla K40c Comparison

# FAQ

Q: How do the two GPUs compare in raw compute performance?

A: The AMD Radeon RX 9060 delivers 21.43 TFLOPS of FP32 compute, while the NVIDIA Tesla K40c delivers 5.046 TFLOPS. That is roughly 4.25 times higher peak single-precision throughput for the AMD card.

Q: Which card has more memory, and does it matter?

A: The Tesla K40c has 12 GB of GDDR5 on a 384-bit bus, while the RX 9060 has 8 GB of GDDR6 on a 128-bit bus. Despite the capacity and bus width differences, memory bandwidth is nearly identical: 288.4 GB/s for the Tesla versus 288.0 GB/s for the RX 9060.

Q: What are the clock speed differences?

A: The Tesla K40c runs at a 745 MHz base and 876 MHz boost. The RX 9060 runs at 1700 MHz base, 2400 MHz game clock, and 2990 MHz boost. The AMD card operates at more than triple the boost frequency of the NVIDIA card.

Q: Which GPU is more power-efficient per the data?

A: The RX 9060 has a 132 W TDP and requires a 300 W suggested PSU, while the Tesla K40c has a 245 W TDP and requires a 550 W suggested PSU. The AMD card draws nearly half the power while delivering far higher compute throughput.

Q: What API feature levels does each card support?

A: The RX 9060 supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.4. The Tesla K40c supports DirectX 12 (11_0), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.2.175. The AMD card also has 28 ray tracing cores, which the Tesla lacks entirely.

Q: How do they rank among all GPUs?

A: The Tesla K40c sits at the 61st percentile, while the RX 9060 sits at the 59th percentile. However, the Tesla's average benchmark score is 17,468, and the RX 9060's average is 16,014 — the percentile ranking reflects different benchmark distributions rather than a clear performance order.

Architecture Differences

The NVIDIA Tesla K40c is built on the Kepler architecture, using the GK180 chip manufactured on TSMC's 28 nm process. It packs 7,080 million transistors on a 561 mm² die, yielding a transistor density of 12.6 million per square millimeter. This is a compute-oriented design from the Tesla Kepler generation, with 2,880 shading units, 240 texture mapping units, and 48 raster operation pipelines. It has no ray tracing cores and no tensor cores — a pure raster compute design.

The AMD Radeon RX 9060 uses the RDNA 4.0 architecture with the Navi 44 chip, built on TSMC's 4 nm process. It integrates 29,700 million transistors on a much smaller 199 mm² die, achieving a transistor density of 149.2 million per square millimeter — nearly 12 times denser than the Tesla. The chip has 1,792 shading units, 112 TMUs, and 64 ROPs, plus 28 dedicated ray tracing cores. It also supports FP16 compute at a 1:1 ratio with FP32, delivering 21.43 TFLOPS for both precisions, whereas the Tesla has no listed FP16 capability.

The memory subsystems differ fundamentally. The Tesla uses 12 GB of GDDR5 across a 384-bit interface, while the RX 9060 uses 8 GB of GDDR6 across a 128-bit interface. Bandwidth is a near tie, but the bus width difference reflects two very different design philosophies: the Tesla leans on a wide bus to compensate for slower memory clocks, while the RX 9060 uses faster GDDR6 to achieve similar bandwidth on a narrow bus.

The RX 9060 also supports modern PCIe 5.0 x16, versus PCIe 3.0 x16 on the Tesla. Display outputs are another differentiator — the Tesla has no display outputs at all, while the RX 9060 offers 1x HDMI 2.1b and 2x DisplayPort 2.1a. The Tesla is a compute accelerator with no video output, while the RX 9060 is a full graphics card.

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The only directly comparable benchmark between the two is Geekbench OpenCL, and the result is decisive. The AMD Radeon RX 9060 scores 88,183, while the NVIDIA Tesla K40c scores 17,468. The delta is -80.2% from the AMD card's perspective, meaning the Tesla delivers only about 20% of the RX 9060's OpenCL score. This is a massive generational leap — the RX 9060 outperforms the Tesla by a factor of roughly 5.05 in this specific test.

Looking at the Tesla's nearest rivals gives context: it sits within 1% of the AMD Radeon Pro 460 (17,509), AMD Radeon Pro 560 (17,551), AMD Radeon 780M (17,588), and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 (17,639). The Tesla is effectively at parity with these modern entry-level and integrated GPUs in OpenCL compute, which underscores how far behind the RX 9060 it is.

The RX 9060's nearest rivals tell a different story. It sits within 1% of the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti (16,129) and AMD Radeon RX 7700 (15,852) in average benchmark score, and within 2.1% of the AMD Radeon Pro W5500 (15,679). Its average benchmark score of 16,014 places it in the company of mid-range GPUs from recent generations, not the top-tier compute accelerators.

The RX 9060 also has additional benchmark data beyond OpenCL. In 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 it scores 3,322; in Geekbench Vulkan it scores 39,476; and in Passmark tests it scores 17,631 (G3D), 9,919 (GPU Compute), 1,002 (G2D), 280 (DX9), 182 (DX11), 104 (DX10), and 44 (DX12). The Tesla has no comparable data for these tests, so direct comparisons are limited to OpenCL.

The Verdict

The data paints an unambiguous picture for compute workloads: the AMD Radeon RX 9060 is the overwhelmingly faster card in OpenCL, with a score of 88,183 versus 17,468 for the NVIDIA Tesla K40c. The RX 9060 also offers modern features the Tesla completely lacks — ray tracing cores, FP16 support, DirectX 12 Ultimate, PCIe 5.0, and display outputs — while consuming nearly half the power (132 W versus 245 W).

The Tesla K40c's only advantages are memory capacity (12 GB versus 8 GB) and a wider memory bus (384-bit versus 128-bit), though actual bandwidth is nearly identical. It also has a higher percentile ranking (61st versus 59th), but that ranking is based on a single benchmark and does not reflect the massive OpenCL performance gap.

For anyone choosing between these two today, the RX 9060 is the rational pick for virtually every use case. It is faster, more feature-rich, more power-efficient, and remains an active product with a successor lineage. The Tesla K40c is end-of-life, with no display output, older API support, and a launch MSRP of 7,699 USD — a price that reflects its original enterprise positioning rather than any current value.

Specification Differences

| Specification | NVIDIA Tesla K40c | AMD Radeon RX 9060 |

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

| Architecture | Kepler | RDNA 4.0 |

| Chip | GK180 | Navi 44 |

| Process Node | 28 nm | 4 nm |

| Transistors | 7,080 million | 29,700 million |

| Die Size | 561 mm² | 199 mm² |

| Transistor Density | 12.6M / mm² | 149.2M / mm² |

| Base Clock | 745 MHz | 1700 MHz |

| Boost Clock | 876 MHz | 2990 MHz |

| Memory Size | 12 GB | 8 GB |

| Memory Type | GDDR5 | GDDR6 |

| Memory Bus Width | 384 bit | 128 bit |

| Shading Units | 2880 | 1792 |

| TMUs | 240 | 112 |

| ROPs | 48 | 64 |

| RT Cores | None | 28 |

| FP32 Performance | 5.046 TFLOPS | 21.43 TFLOPS |

| FP16 Performance | None listed | 21.43 TFLOPS (1:1) |

| Pixel Rate | 52.56 GPixel/s | 191.4 GPixel/s |

| Texture Rate | 210.2 GTexel/s | 334.9 GTexel/s |

| TDP | 245 W | 132 W |

| Power Connectors | 1x 6-pin + 1x 8-pin | 1x 8-pin |

| Suggested PSU | 550 W | 300 W |

| Bus Interface | PCIe 3.0 x16 | PCIe 5.0 x16 |

| Display Outputs | No outputs | 1x HDMI 2.1b, 2x DisplayPort 2.1a |

| DirectX | 12 (11_0) | 12 Ultimate (12_2) |

| Vulkan | 1.2.175 | 1.4 |

| Production Status | End-of-life | Active |

| Release Date | 2013-10-07 | 2025-08-04 |

Where Each One Wins

The AMD Radeon RX 9060 wins in every measurable performance category from the data. It dominates OpenCL compute with an 80.2% lead over the Tesla. It has a 4.25x advantage in FP32 throughput, a 3.64x advantage in pixel rate, and a 1.59x advantage in texture rate. It also wins decisively on power efficiency, requiring 132 W instead of 245 W and a 300 W PSU instead of 550 W.

The RX 9060 is the clear choice for gaming and modern graphics workloads. It supports DirectX 12 Ultimate and Vulkan 1.4, includes 28 ray tracing cores, and has display outputs for direct connection to monitors. Its FP16 support at 1:1 ratio makes it suitable for compute tasks that leverage mixed-precision arithmetic.

The NVIDIA Tesla K40c wins only on memory capacity, offering 12 GB versus 8 GB. This could matter for workloads that need to hold larger datasets in VRAM, but the nearly identical bandwidth means the RX 9060 will likely move data just as fast despite the smaller pool. The Tesla also has a slightly higher percentile ranking (61 versus 59), though this is a single-point metric from one benchmark.

For legacy compute environments that specifically require Kepler architecture or Tesla-class features, the K40c might still have a niche. Its 384-bit bus and larger memory footprint could be relevant for specific scientific computing tasks that were optimized for that hardware generation. But the production status is end-of-life, and the 2013 release date means driver support and compatibility will only become more limited over time.

The RX 9060 is the practical recommendation for essentially all new deployments. It is active, modern, faster in every benchmark, more efficient, and offers a complete feature set. The Tesla K40c is a historical artifact — interesting for its 7,080 million transistors on a 561 mm² die, but not a competitive choice against a GPU released twelve years later with a 149.2M / mm² transistor density.