AMD Radeon RX 480 vs NVIDIA RTX A1000 Comparison

The NVIDIA RTX A1000 and AMD Radeon RX 480 represent two distinct eras of GPU design, separated by nearly a decade of architectural evolution. The RTX A1000, built on the Ampere architecture and fabricated on Samsung's 8 nm process, is a modern workstation-focused card with 8 GB of GDDR6 memory. The RX 480, using the older GCN 4.0 architecture on GlobalFoundries' 14 nm process, was a mainstream consumer card that also shipped with 8 GB, but of GDDR5. Benchmark data shows the RTX A1000 wins all three head-to-head tests, with its most significant victory coming in the Geekbench OpenCL test, where it outperforms the RX 480 by 37.1%. The two cards sit extremely close in overall average benchmark scores—34,207 for the RTX A1000 versus 33,997 for the RX 480—placing them in the 79th and 78th percentiles of all GPUs, respectively. This near-parity in overall standing, despite the RTX A1000's clear wins in individual tests, creates a nuanced comparison that hinges on specific workloads and API implementations.

FAQ

Q: Which GPU has a higher average benchmark score?

A: The NVIDIA RTX A1000 has a higher average benchmark score of 34,207, compared to the AMD Radeon RX 480's 33,997. The RTX A1000 also edges out the RX 480 in the average score by a delta of 0.6%, according to the nearestRivals data.

Q: How do the two cards compare in the 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 test?

A: The RTX A1000 wins this test with a score of 969, versus 966 for the RX 480, a margin of just 0.3%. This result indicates that the two GPUs are effectively tied in this particular DirectX 12 workload.

Q: What is the largest performance gap between the two cards in any benchmark?

A: The largest gap is in the Geekbench OpenCL test, where the RTX A1000 scores 52,078 and the RX 480 scores 37,998. This represents a 37.1% advantage for the RTX A1000, a substantial lead in this compute-oriented test.

Q: Does the RX 480 win any benchmark against the RTX A1000?

A: No. The head-to-head benchmark data shows the RTX A1000 winning all three tests: 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12, Geekbench OpenCL, and Geekbench Vulkan. The wins tally is 3 for the RTX A1000 and 0 for the RX 480.

Q: Which GPU supports hardware ray tracing?

A: The NVIDIA RTX A1000 includes 18 RT cores, which enables hardware-accelerated ray tracing. The AMD Radeon RX 480 has no RT cores listed in its specifications, indicating it does not support this feature.

Q: What is the difference in their DirectX API support?

A: The RTX A1000 supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2), while the RX 480 supports DirectX 12 (12_0). This means the RTX A1000 is compatible with the latest DirectX 12 Ultimate features, such as mesh shaders and variable rate shading.

Architecture Differences

The architectural gap between these two GPUs is vast, reflecting their different release dates and design goals. The NVIDIA RTX A1000 is built on the Ampere architecture, using a GA107 chip manufactured on Samsung's 8 nm process. It packs 8,700 million transistors on a 200 mm² die, yielding a transistor density of 43.5 million transistors per mm². In contrast, the AMD Radeon RX 480 utilizes the GCN 4.0 architecture, with an Ellesmere chip produced on GlobalFoundries' 14 nm process. The RX 480 contains 5,700 million transistors on a larger 232 mm² die, resulting in a much lower density of 24.6 million transistors per mm².

The most significant feature divergence is in specialized hardware. The RTX A1000 includes 18 RT cores for ray tracing and 72 tensor cores for AI acceleration, features entirely absent from the RX 480, which lists no RT or tensor cores. Both GPUs have 2,304 shading units, but the RTX A1000 pairs them with 72 texture mapping units (TMUs) and 32 render output units (ROPs). The RX 480, by contrast, has double the TMUs at 144, but the same 32 ROPs. This difference in texture units suggests the RX 480 was designed to excel at traditional fill-rate-bound rasterization, while the RTX A1000 allocates die space to its RT and tensor cores. The RTX A1000 also features a newer PCIe 4.0 x8 interface, whereas the RX 480 uses the older PCIe 3.0 x16 standard. Both cards support similar API levels, but the RTX A1000 reaches DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2) and Vulkan 1.4, while the RX 480 tops out at DirectX 12 (12_0) and Vulkan 1.3.

Where Each One Wins

The benchmark results paint a clear picture of where each GPU excels. The NVIDIA RTX A1000 is the definitive winner in compute-heavy workloads, as evidenced by its dominant 37.1% lead in the Geekbench OpenCL test. This makes it the stronger choice for general-purpose GPU computing, scientific simulations, or any task that leverages OpenCL for parallel processing. Its advantage extends to Vulkan-based applications, where it leads by 7.8% in Geekbench Vulkan, suggesting better performance in modern cross-platform game engines and compute APIs.

The AMD Radeon RX 480, despite losing all benchmarks, shows its competitive edge in specific rasterization scenarios. Its 144 TMUs provide a texture rate of 182.3 GTexel/s, which is significantly higher than the RTX A1000's 105.3 GTexel/s. This indicates the RX 480 could win in texture-bound workloads, such as high-resolution texture filtering in older DirectX 11 titles. Furthermore, the RX 480's 256-bit memory bus provides 256.0 GB/s of bandwidth, a 33% advantage over the RTX A1000's 192.0 GB/s. This wider bus could prove beneficial in memory-intensive scenarios that are not captured by the specific benchmarks listed. The 3DMark Steel Nomad test shows a near-tie, with the RTX A1000 winning by a negligible 0.3%, suggesting that in balanced gaming workloads, the two cards are virtually indistinguishable in raw performance.

Specification Differences

| Specification | NVIDIA RTX A1000 | AMD Radeon RX 480 |

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

| Architecture | Ampere | GCN 4.0 |

| Process Node | 8 nm (Samsung) | 14 nm (GlobalFoundries) |

| Transistors | 8,700 million | 5,700 million |

| Die Size | 200 mm² | 232 mm² |

| Transistor Density | 43.5M / mm² | 24.6M / mm² |

| Base Clock | 727 MHz | 1120 MHz |

| Boost Clock | 1462 MHz | 1266 MHz |

| Memory Type | GDDR6 | GDDR5 |

| Memory Bus Width | 128 bit | 256 bit |

| Memory Bandwidth | 192.0 GB/s | 256.0 GB/s |

| Memory Clock | 1500 MHz (12 Gbps effective) | 2000 MHz (8 Gbps effective) |

| TMUs | 72 | 144 |

| RT Cores | 18 | None |

| Tensor Cores | 72 | None |

| Pixel Rate | 46.78 GPixel/s | 40.51 GPixel/s |

| Texture Rate | 105.3 GTexel/s | 182.3 GTexel/s |

| FP32 Performance | 6.737 TFLOPS | 5.834 TFLOPS |

| TDP | 50 W | 150 W |

| Slot Width | Single-slot | Dual-slot |

| Power Connectors | None | 1x 6-pin |

| Suggested PSU | 250 W | 450 W |

| Bus Interface | PCIe 4.0 x8 | PCIe 3.0 x16 |

| Display Outputs | 4x mini-DisplayPort 1.4a | 1x HDMI 2.0b, 3x DisplayPort 1.4a |

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

| Vulkan Support | 1.4 | 1.3 |

| Dimensions (LxH) | 163 mm x 69 mm | 240 mm x 95 mm |

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

| Release Date | 2024-04-15 | 2016-06-28 |

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The head-to-head benchmark comparison shows a consistent, though not always overwhelming, victory for the NVIDIA RTX A1000. The most striking result is in Geekbench OpenCL, where the RTX A1000 scores 52,078 versus the RX 480's 37,998. This 37.1% delta is the largest performance gap in any test and highlights the RTX A1000's architectural superiority in compute workloads. The Ampere architecture's tensor cores and more modern design likely contribute to this substantial lead, making the RTX A1000 the clear choice for machine learning inference or other compute tasks that can utilize its specialized hardware.

In Geekbench Vulkan, the RTX A1000 again comes out ahead, scoring 49,574 against the RX 480's 45,968, a 7.8% difference. This shows that the RTX A1000 maintains its lead in modern, low-level graphics APIs, which are increasingly important in both gaming and professional visualization. The closer margin compared to OpenCL suggests that the RX 480's GCN architecture still holds up reasonably well in Vulkan workloads, but it cannot overcome the RTX A1000's fundamental advantages in clock speed and memory efficiency.

The 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 test is the closest contest, with the RTX A1000 scoring 969 and the RX 480 scoring 966, a delta of only 0.3%. This near-tie indicates that in a traditional DirectX 12 gaming scenario, the two GPUs perform essentially identically. The RX 480's higher texture rate and memory bandwidth help it compensate for the RTX A1000's higher FP32 compute, resulting in a statistical dead heat. This result underscores that for pure rasterization gaming at standard resolutions, the age gap between the two cards does not translate into a significant performance difference, despite the RTX A1000's newer architecture and features.