GPU Comparison

NVIDIA GeForce MX230 and AMD Radeon RX 6400 are both end-of-life mobile graphics solutions, yet they occupy vastly different performance strata. The MX230, a 2019 entry-level part built on Pascal, offers basic acceleration for thin-and-light laptops. The RX 6400, a 2022 RDNA 2 part, targets more demanding 1080p gaming. The benchmark data confirms a decisive generational and architectural gap, with the RX 6400 dominating in every measurable compute and graphics workload.

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The head-to-head data presents a stark picture of performance disparity. In the Geekbench OpenCL test, the AMD Radeon RX 6400 scores 32,011 against the NVIDIA GeForce MX230’s 5,739. This represents a staggering -82.1% delta from the perspective of the MX230, meaning the RX 6400 is roughly 5.6 times faster in raw compute throughput. This is not a marginal win; it is a complete rout, reflecting the fundamental differences in shader count, memory bandwidth, and architecture efficiency.

The Geekbench Vulkan test tells a similar story, though with a slightly narrower gap. The RX 6400 achieves 16,372 points, while the MX230 manages 6,414. The delta here is -60.8%, indicating the RX 6400 is approximately 2.5 times faster in this graphics API workload. While the relative margin is smaller than in OpenCL, the absolute difference remains enormous. The MX230’s Vulkan score is actually higher than its OpenCL score, suggesting its Pascal architecture handles the lower-level API reasonably well for its class, but it cannot overcome the sheer hardware advantage of the RX 6400.

Across both benchmark disciplines, the AMD part wins every single head-to-head comparison. The data shows 2 wins for the AMD Radeon RX 6400 and 0 wins for the NVIDIA GeForce MX230. The average benchmark score for the RX 6400 is 6,001, while the MX230 sits at 6,077, a difference of less than 1.3% in the overall aggregate. This near-parity in average score is misleading, however, as the RX 6400’s average is dragged down by its inclusion of lower-scoring tests like Passmark DirectX 9 (93) and 3DMark Steel Nomad (176), which are not run on the MX230. In the tests where both parts are present, the RX 6400 is overwhelmingly superior. The percentile ranking for both is identical at 35%, placing them in the same broad tier of all GPUs, but this is a statistical artifact of the different test suites applied to each card.

FAQ

Q: Which GPU is faster in compute-heavy workloads?

A: The AMD Radeon RX 6400 is dramatically faster. In the Geekbench OpenCL test, it scores 32,011 versus the MX230’s 5,739, a -82.1% delta. Its FP32 compute of 3.565 TFLOPS dwarfs the MX230’s 783.9 GFLOPS.

Q: How does the memory configuration affect performance?

A: The RX 6400 has 4 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 64-bit bus, delivering 128.0 GB/s of bandwidth. The MX230 has 2 GB of GDDR5 on the same bus width, yielding only 48.06 GB/s. This 2.66x bandwidth advantage is a primary driver of the RX 6400’s superior frame rates.

Q: Which GPU has better API support?

A: The AMD RX 6400 supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2), while the NVIDIA MX230 supports DirectX 12 (12_1). Both support OpenGL 4.6 and Vulkan 1.4. The RX 6400 also includes 12 ray tracing cores, which the MX230 lacks entirely.

Q: Are these GPUs comparable for gaming?

A: No. The RX 6400 is in a different performance class. Its Passmark G3D score of 7,673 indicates it can handle modern titles at 1080p with adjusted settings, while the MX230’s lower compute and bandwidth figures place it firmly in the field of light, older, or esports titles.

Q: What are the power consumption differences?

A: The AMD RX 6400 has a TDP of 53 W and recommends a 250 W power supply. The NVIDIA MX230 has a TDP of just 10 W and requires no power connectors, being an integrated-class part. The RX 6400 is a single-slot card, while the MX230 is an IGP.

Q: Which GPU has a higher transistor density?

A: The AMD RX 6400, built on a 6 nm process at TSMC, has a transistor density of 50.5M / mm². The NVIDIA MX230, on Samsung’s 14 nm node, has a density of 24.3M / mm². This explains the RX 6400’s higher performance per watt and per square millimeter.

Where Each One Wins

The AMD Radeon RX 6400 wins in virtually every scenario that requires graphics or compute horsepower. Its 128.0 GB/s memory bandwidth and 3.565 TFLOPS FP32 throughput make it suitable for 1080p gaming on medium to high settings, hardware-accelerated video encoding, and light 3D rendering. The presence of 12 ray tracing cores provides entry-level ray-traced effects, a feature entirely absent on the MX230. Its 4 GB frame buffer also allows for larger textures and higher resolutions than the MX230’s 2 GB. The RX 6400 is the clear choice for any user needing a discrete GPU for active gaming or creative workloads.

The NVIDIA GeForce MX230 finds its niche in ultra-portable, power-constrained systems. With a 10 W TDP and an IGP form factor, it is designed for basic desktop acceleration, video playback, and legacy application support. It is not a gaming GPU by modern standards. Its 783.9 GFLOPS of FP32 power is sufficient for casual 2D applications and older 3D titles, but it will struggle with any modern game. Its advantage lies solely in its minimal power draw and lack of cooling requirements, making it suitable for fanless or passively cooled designs. The MX230 wins only in the category of absolute power efficiency, where its low TDP is a virtue.

Specification Differences

The specification gap between these two GPUs is vast. The AMD Radeon RX 6400 features 768 shading units, 48 texture mapping units, and 32 ROPs, compared to the MX230’s 256 shaders, 16 TMUs, and 16 ROPs. This triples the shader count and quadruples the texture throughput. The RX 6400’s pixel rate is 74.27 GPixel/s versus 24.50 GPixel/s for the MX230. Its texture rate of 111.4 GTexel/s dwarfs the MX230’s 24.50 GTexel/s. Clock speeds also differ significantly: the RX 6400 boosts to 2321 MHz with a game clock of 2039 MHz, while the MX230 boosts to only 1531 MHz. Memory is another major differentiator, with the RX 6400 using 16 Gbps effective GDDR6 and the MX230 using 6 Gbps effective GDDR5. The RX 6400 also supports a PCIe 4.0 x4 interface, whereas the MX230 is limited to PCIe 3.0 x4.

Architecture Differences

The architectural chasm between these two parts is the root cause of their performance disparity. The NVIDIA MX230 is built on the Pascal architecture using the GP108 chip, manufactured on a 14 nm process at Samsung. It packs 1,800 million transistors into a 74 mm² die. Pascal is a mature architecture from 2016, lacking dedicated ray tracing or tensor cores. It delivers FP16 at a paltry 12.25 GFLOPS (1:64 rate), indicating a strong focus on FP32 workloads.

In contrast, the AMD RX 6400 uses the RDNA 2.0 architecture on the Navi 24 chip, built on a high-end 6 nm process at TSMC. It contains 5,400 million transistors in a 107 mm² die, achieving a transistor density of 50.5M / mm² versus the MX230’s 24.3M / mm². RDNA 2.0 is a modern, highly efficient architecture that supports hardware ray tracing via 12 RT cores. Its FP16 performance is 7.130 TFLOPS (2:1 rate), double its FP32 rate, enabling faster mixed-precision compute. The RX 6400 is part of the Navi II (RX 6000) generation, while the MX230 is from the older GeForce MX (2xx) line. This generational leap, combined with the denser manufacturing process, explains why the RX 6400 delivers over four times the FP32 throughput while drawing only 53 W versus 10 W, a tradeoff of higher power for exponentially more performance.