Dictionary

GPU— The Graphics Processing Unit is the central intelligence of your graphics card, just as the CPU is for the rest of your PC. Its hundreds or thousands of tiny stream processors power through the highly parallel workloads that are required to render each frame of your game.

Stream processors

(SPs)— Tiny processing cores like the cores of a CPU but far simpler. The more of them and the faster their clock speed, the faster your framerate. Architectural differences mean you can’t directly compare AMD SPs to Nvidia SPs, though.

Video memory— Otherwise known as VRAM, this is the high-speed memory on a graphics card that allows the GPU quick access to all the data it needs, such as textures, polygons, and so on. Not enough means having to access much slower system memory.

AIB— Add In Board partners are the likes of Asus and XFX who take the chips designed by AMD and Nvidia and build them into the graphics cards you can actually buy. Overclocking, custom coolers and other extras allow each AIB to differentiate its product.

Bang for buck (BfB)— The cost per frames per second of each graphics card. Calculated by taking the average fps in our tests divided by the cost of the card. It’s a raw indication of value.