NVIDIA RTX A5000 vs NVIDIA Tesla M40 24 GB Comparison

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The recorded data leaves no ambiguity about the performance hierarchy between these two workstation GPUs. In the shared benchmark suite, the NVIDIA RTX A5000 dominates the NVIDIA Tesla M40 24 GB across every test where both have scores. The most decisive gap appears in Geekbench OpenCL, where the RTX A5000 posts a score of 157,905 against the Tesla M40's 37,439. That represents a 76.3% deficit for the older card, meaning the RTX A5000 delivers roughly four times the raw compute throughput in this workload. The margin is slightly narrower but still overwhelming in Geekbench Vulkan: the RTX A5000 scores 137,828, while the Tesla M40 manages 45,975, a 66.6% shortfall.

These deltas are not marginal improvements, they are generational leaps. The RTX A5000's OpenCL score places it far outside the Tesla M40's reach, and the Vulkan result confirms the same pattern in a modern graphics API. The Tesla M40 does not win a single head-to-head benchmark in the database. It trails in every recorded comparison, and the average benchmark scores tell a similar story. The Tesla M40 averages 41,707 across its tests, while the RTX A5000 averages 33,622. The apparent contradiction here warrants attention: the Tesla M40's average is higher despite losing every shared test. This occurs because the two cards were measured on different benchmark sets. The RTX A5000's average includes additional tests such as PassMark DirectX 9, 10, 11, and 12, plus PassMark G2D, G3D, and GPU Compute, many of which produce lower raw scores that drag down its mean. The Tesla M40's average only reflects its two Geekbench results, both of which are strong enough to keep its mean elevated.

Looking at the percentile rankings, the Tesla M40 sits at the 83rd percentile among all GPUs, while the RTX A5000 ranks at the 78th percentile. This is a curious inversion given the RTX A5000's clear benchmark wins. The explanation lies in the distribution of scores across the database: the RTX A5000's broader test suite includes older DirectX workloads where it scores relatively low (for example, 153 in PassMark DirectX 10 and 87 in PassMark DirectX 12), pulling its percentile down despite its massive lead in modern compute tests. The Tesla M40, by contrast, was only evaluated in two modern API tests where it performs respectably relative to the full GPU population.

The nearest rivals for each card further contextualize their positions. The Tesla M40's closest competitor is the NVIDIA Tesla M40 (the non-24 GB variant), with an average score of 41,897, placing the 24 GB model 0.5% behind. The GeForce RTX 3080 Ti sits 1.3% behind the Tesla M40 24 GB, and the AMD Radeon Pro 5300 trails by 2%. The AMD Radeon RX 7650 GRE actually beats the Tesla M40 by 2.4%. For the RTX A5000, the nearest rival is the GeForce GTX 1060 5 GB, which sits 0.2% behind in average score, followed by the AMD Radeon RX 7700S (0.7% behind), the AMD Radeon HD 7950 (1% behind), and the AMD Radeon RX 480 (1.1% behind). These rival groupings show that the RTX A5000, despite its high-end workstation positioning, lands in a competitive segment populated by mid-range gaming cards when averaged across all its benchmark results.

Architecture Differences

The architectural gap between these two GPUs spans five years and two completely different design philosophies. The Tesla M40 uses the GM200 chip built on Maxwell 2.0 architecture, fabricated on TSMC's 28 nm process. The RTX A5000 uses the GA102 chip on Ampere architecture, built on Samsung's 8 nm process. The transistor counts illustrate the scale of advancement: the GM200 packs 8,000 million transistors on a 601 mm² die, while the GA102 contains 28,300 million transistors on a 628 mm² die. That is a 3.5-fold increase in transistor count on a nearly identical die size, enabled by the denser manufacturing process. Transistor density jumps from 13.3 million per square millimeter on the Tesla M40 to 45.1 million per square millimeter on the RTX A5000.

Clock speeds also shift substantially. The Tesla M40 operates at a 948 MHz base clock and 1,112 MHz boost, while the RTX A5000 runs at 1,170 MHz base and 1,695 MHz boost. The RTX A5000's boost clock is over 50% higher, and combined with the greater shader count, this produces a massive throughput advantage. The Tesla M40 has 3,072 shading units, 192 texture mapping units, and 96 render output units. The RTX A5000 has 8,192 shading units, 256 TMUs, and 96 ROPs. The shading unit count is more than 2.5 times higher on the RTX A5000, while TMUs increase by a third. Both cards share the same 96 ROP count, meaning pixel output capabilities are less differentiated than compute resources.

The RTX A5000 also introduces hardware features that did not exist in the Maxwell generation. It includes 64 ray tracing cores and 256 tensor cores, neither of which the Tesla M40 possesses. These dedicated units enable hardware-accelerated ray tracing and AI-accelerated workloads, capabilities that the Tesla M40 cannot offer at all. The memory subsystems differ as well. Both cards have 24 GB of VRAM and a 384-bit bus, but the Tesla M40 uses GDDR5 at 1,502 MHz (6 Gbps effective), yielding 288.4 GB/s of bandwidth. The RTX A5000 uses GDDR6 at 2,000 MHz (16 Gbps effective), producing 768.0 GB/s of bandwidth. That is a 2.7-fold bandwidth advantage for the RTX A5000, critical for memory-intensive workloads.

The compute output reflects all these differences. The Tesla M40 delivers 6.832 TFLOPS of FP32 performance, while the RTX A5000 delivers 27.77 TFLOPS. The RTX A5000 also offers FP16 at 27.77 TFLOPS on a 1:1 ratio, while the Tesla M40 has no recorded FP16 capability. Pixel fill rates are 106.8 GPixel/s for the Tesla M40 versus 162.7 GPixel/s for the RTX A5000, and texture fill rates are 213.5 GTexel/s versus 433.9 GTexel/s. The RTX A5000 leads in every throughput metric except ROP count, where they tie.

Power and connectivity also differ. The Tesla M40 has a 250 W TDP and requires an 8-pin EPS connector with a 600 W suggested PSU. The RTX A5000 has a 230 W TDP, uses a single 8-pin connector, and suggests a 550 W PSU. The RTX A5000 achieves far higher performance while consuming less power, a direct result of the more efficient architecture and process node. The bus interface moves from PCIe 3.0 x16 on the Tesla M40 to PCIe 4.0 x16 on the RTX A5000. Display outputs are another major difference: the Tesla M40 has no display outputs at all, while the RTX A5000 provides four DisplayPort 1.4a connectors. The Tesla M40 is a compute-only accelerator, whereas the RTX A5000 can drive displays directly.

API support also differs. The Tesla M40 supports DirectX 12 (12_1), while the RTX A5000 supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2). Both support OpenGL 4.6 and Vulkan 1.4. The RTX A5000's DirectX 12 Ultimate support brings features like mesh shaders and variable rate shading that the Maxwell architecture cannot handle. The Tesla M40 measures 267 mm in length, matching the RTX A5000's 267 mm, but the RTX A5000 also has a recorded height of 112 mm whereas the Tesla M40's height is not listed. Both are dual-slot cards.

The Verdict

The data points to a clear conclusion: the RTX A5000 is the superior GPU in every measurable way. It wins both shared benchmarks by margins of 66.6% and 76.3%, offers more than four times the FP32 throughput, nearly three times the memory bandwidth, and adds ray tracing and tensor cores that the Tesla M40 simply lacks. The Tesla M40's only advantages are its higher percentile ranking (83rd versus 78th) and its higher average benchmark score (41,707 versus 33,622), but both of these are artifacts of different test coverage rather than genuine performance superiority. The Tesla M40 was evaluated only in two Geekbench tests, while the RTX A5000 faced a broader and more demanding suite that includes legacy DirectX workloads. Users who rely on modern compute workloads, GPU-accelerated rendering, or AI inference should choose the RTX A5000 without hesitation. The Tesla M40 remains relevant only for legacy deployments where its Maxwell architecture is already integrated into an existing workflow, and even then, its lack of display outputs and older API support limit its flexibility. The RTX A5000's lower TDP of 230 W versus 250 W, combined with its massive performance lead, makes it the better choice on both performance and efficiency grounds.

FAQ

Q: Which GPU wins in Geekbench OpenCL?

A: The NVIDIA RTX A5000 wins decisively with a score of 157,905, while the NVIDIA Tesla M40 24 GB scores 37,439. The RTX A5000 leads by 76.3%.

Q: Do both cards have the same amount of memory?

A: Yes, both the NVIDIA Tesla M40 24 GB and the NVIDIA RTX A5000 have 24 GB of VRAM and a 384-bit memory bus.

Q: Which card supports ray tracing?

A: Only the NVIDIA RTX A5000 has ray tracing cores, with 64 dedicated RT cores. The NVIDIA Tesla M40 24 GB has no ray tracing hardware.

Q: How do their power requirements compare?

A: The NVIDIA Tesla M40 24 GB has a 250 W TDP and a suggested 600 W PSU, while the NVIDIA RTX A5000 has a 230 W TDP and a suggested 550 W PSU.

Q: Can either card output to displays?

A: The NVIDIA Tesla M40 24 GB has no display outputs, while the NVIDIA RTX A5000 provides four DisplayPort 1.4a connectors.

Q: What is the memory bandwidth difference?

A: The NVIDIA Tesla M40 24 GB offers 288.4 GB/s of bandwidth, while the NVIDIA RTX A5000 offers 768.0 GB/s, a 2.7-fold advantage.

Where Each One Wins

The RTX A5000 wins in every category that matters for modern workloads. It dominates in compute-heavy tasks, offering 27.77 TFLOPS of FP32 against the Tesla M40's 6.832 TFLOPS. This makes it the clear choice for scientific simulation, machine learning training, and GPU rendering, where raw shader throughput translates directly into reduced processing times. Its 768.0 GB/s memory bandwidth versus 288.4 GB/s means it handles large datasets far more efficiently, and its 64 ray tracing cores enable hardware-accelerated ray tracing that the Tesla M40 cannot perform at all. The 256 tensor cores further extend its lead in AI workloads, allowing accelerated matrix operations that the Maxwell architecture has no hardware support for. The RTX A5000 also wins on memory technology, using GDDR6 at 16 Gbps effective versus the Tesla M40's GDDR5 at 6 Gbps, and its PCIe 4.0 interface provides double the bus bandwidth of PCIe 3.0. Its four DisplayPort 1.4a outputs make it suitable for direct display workloads, while the Tesla M40 is confined to headless compute deployments.

The Tesla M40 has only narrow or contextual advantages. Its 83rd percentile ranking versus 78th for the RTX A5000 reflects its strong performance within its limited test set, but does not indicate superiority in any real workload. Its average benchmark score of 41,707 exceeds the RTX A5000's 33,622 only because the RTX A5000 was subjected to additional tests that dragged its average down. In terms of closest rival positioning, the Tesla M40 sits within 2.4% of several modern GPUs including the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti and AMD Radeon RX 7650 GRE, showing it remains competitive in certain synthetic tests. However, the Tesla M40's nearest rival is its own sibling, the non-24 GB Tesla M40, which beats it by 0.5%. The RTX A5000's nearest rivals include the GeForce GTX 1060 5 GB and AMD Radeon RX 480, suggesting its average performance lands in a lower tier, but this is a statistical artifact of its broader test coverage. Users should rely on the head-to-head results, where the RTX A5000 wins both shared benchmarks by margins of at least 66.6%.

Specification Differences

The two cards differ across nearly every specification category. The chip is GM200 on the Tesla M40 versus GA102 on the RTX A5000, with Maxwell 2.0 architecture against Ampere. The process node is 28 nm at TSMC for the Tesla M40 and 8 nm at Samsung for the RTX A5000. Transistor count is 8,000 million versus 28,300 million, and die size is 601 mm² versus 628 mm². Transistor density is 13.3 million per mm² versus 45.1 million per mm². Base clocks are 948 MHz versus 1,170 MHz, boost clocks are 1,112 MHz versus 1,695 MHz, and memory clocks are 1,502 MHz (6 Gbps effective) versus 2,000 MHz (16 Gbps effective). Memory type is GDDR5 versus GDDR6, with bandwidth of 288.4 GB/s versus 768.0 GB/s. Shading units are 3,072 versus 8,192, TMUs are 192 versus 256, and ROPs are identical at 96. The RTX A5000 has 64 ray tracing cores and 256 tensor cores, while the Tesla M40 has none. Pixel rate is 106.8 GPixel/s versus 162.7 GPixel/s, texture rate is 213.5 GTexel/s versus 433.9 GTexel/s, and FP32 is 6.832 TFLOPS versus 27.77 TFLOPS. The RTX A5000 also has FP16 at 27.77 TFLOPS on a 1:1 ratio, while the Tesla M40 has no FP16 figure. TDP is 250 W versus 230 W, power connectors are 8-pin EPS versus 1x 8-pin, and suggested PSU is 600 W versus 550 W. Bus interface is PCIe 3.0 x16 versus PCIe 4.0 x16. Display outputs are none versus 4x DisplayPort 1.4a. DirectX support is 12 (12_1) versus 12 Ultimate (12_2), while both support OpenGL 4.6 and Vulkan 1.4. The Tesla M40 has a length of 267 mm, and the RTX A5000 also has a length of 267 mm with a height of 112 mm. The Tesla M40 was released on 2015-11-09, and the RTX A5000 on 2021-04-11. The Tesla M40's predecessor is Tesla Kepler and successor is Tesla Pascal, while the RTX A5000's predecessor is Quadro Turing and successor is Workstation Ada. Both cards are end-of-life and dual-slot.