GeForce RTX 3060 12 GB GA104 vs Radeon R9 280

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Primary details

GPU architecture, market segment, value for money and other general parameters compared.

Place in the ranking360not rated
Place by popularitynot in top-10052
Cost-effectiveness evaluation5.26no data
Power efficiency4.99no data
ArchitectureGCN 1.0 (2011−2020)Ampere (2020−2024)
GPU code nameTahitiGA104
Market segmentDesktopDesktop
Designreferenceno data
Release date4 March 2014 (10 years ago)1 September 2021 (3 years ago)
Launch price (MSRP)$279 $329

Cost-effectiveness evaluation

Performance to price ratio. The higher, the better.

no data

Detailed specifications

General parameters such as number of shaders, GPU core base clock and boost clock speeds, manufacturing process, texturing and calculation speed. Note that power consumption of some graphics cards can well exceed their nominal TDP, especially when overclocked.

Pipelines / CUDA cores17923584
Core clock speedno data1320 MHz
Boost clock speed933 MHz1777 MHz
Number of transistors4,313 million17,400 million
Manufacturing process technology28 nm8 nm
Power consumption (TDP)200 Watt170 Watt
Texture fill rate104.5199.0
Floating-point processing power3.344 TFLOPS12.74 TFLOPS
ROPs3248
TMUs112112
Tensor Coresno data112
Ray Tracing Coresno data28

Form factor & compatibility

Information on compatibility with other computer components. Useful when choosing a future computer configuration or upgrading an existing one. For desktop graphics cards it's interface and bus (motherboard compatibility), additional power connectors (power supply compatibility).

Bus supportPCIe 3.0no data
InterfacePCIe 3.0 x16PCIe 4.0 x16
Length275 mm242 mm
Width2-slot2-slot
Supplementary power connectors1 x 6-pin + 1 x 8-pin1x 12-pin

VRAM capacity and type

Parameters of VRAM installed: its type, size, bus, clock and resulting bandwidth. Integrated GPUs have no dedicated video RAM and use a shared part of system RAM.

Memory typeGDDR5GDDR6
Maximum RAM amount3 GB12 GB
Memory bus width384 Bit192 Bit
Memory clock speed1250 MHz1875 MHz
Memory bandwidth240 GB/s360.0 GB/s

Connectivity and outputs

Types and number of video connectors present on the reviewed GPUs. As a rule, data in this section is precise only for desktop reference ones (so-called Founders Edition for NVIDIA chips). OEM manufacturers may change the number and type of output ports, while for notebook cards availability of certain video outputs ports depends on the laptop model rather than on the card itself.

Display Connectors2x DVI, 1x HDMI, 2x mini-DisplayPort1x HDMI 2.1, 3x DisplayPort 1.4a
Eyefinity+-
HDMI++

Supported technologies

Supported technological solutions. This information will prove useful if you need some particular technology for your purposes.

CrossFire+-
FreeSync+-
HD3D+-
LiquidVR+-
TressFX+-
TrueAudio+-
UVD+-
DDMA audio+no data

API compatibility

List of supported 3D and general-purpose computing APIs, including their specific versions.

DirectXDirectX® 1212 Ultimate (12_2)
Shader Model5.16.6
OpenGL4.64.6
OpenCL1.23.0
Vulkan+1.3
CUDA-8.6

Pros & cons summary


Recency 4 March 2014 1 September 2021
Maximum RAM amount 3 GB 12 GB
Chip lithography 28 nm 8 nm
Power consumption (TDP) 200 Watt 170 Watt

RTX 3060 12 GB GA104 has an age advantage of 7 years, a 300% higher maximum VRAM amount, a 250% more advanced lithography process, and 17.6% lower power consumption.

We couldn't decide between Radeon R9 280 and GeForce RTX 3060 12 GB GA104. We've got no test results to judge.


Should you still have questions concerning choice between the reviewed GPUs, ask them in Comments section, and we shall answer.

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AMD Radeon R9 280
Radeon R9 280
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 12 GB GA104
GeForce RTX 3060 12 GB GA104

Comparisons with similar GPUs

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Community ratings

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3.6 384 votes

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Questions & comments

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