What is CUDA cores?

[wrenaudrey]

Is it right to say that CUDA cores are like the processors of that graphics card? Like an i5 has a quadcore?
What is it used for? Games?
Whats the ATI equivalent that i should be looking out for when comparing?

Finally: Whats better? CUDA or the ATI equivalent?

Thanks

 

[thently]

Well This is quite complicated. Yes it is the "processors" of the video card.. If you have a dirrect comparison the Cuda cores are better 1 to 1 but that is not the way to compair ATI VS NVIDIA b/c if you look at this last gen the GTX 580 has 512 CUDA cores but the 7970 has 2048 AT Streem cores.. so you cannot compair them as these two cards perform very close to one another... Yes you want a card with more but dont buy a card based on the core count if you got an ATI card with 512 cores you would be very dissapointed but if you got an Nvidia card with 512 Cores you should be very happy.. The cores are used to proccess video to the screen or do calculations for software that uses CUDA or Open CL.

Thent

 

[wrenaudrey]

So whats better? Same chipset...
Palit's GTX560 Ti
http://www.ebuyer.com/320365-palit-gtx-560-ti-448-core-1280mb-gddr5-dual-dvi-hdmi-displayport-ne5x564010da-1101f

OR

ASUS' GTX560 Ti
http://www.ebuyer.com/254405-asus-gtx-560ti-directcu-ii-1gb-gddr5-dual-dvi-mini-hdmi-pci-e-engtx560-ti-dcii-2di-1gd5

Both nearly thesame price. Mainly just different on the amount of CUDAs and different processor speed.
Whats better?

 

[chinoroy]

the GTX 560 Ti 448 Cores.

 

[thently]

The Palit has more cores if you are compairing like branded AKA Nvidia in this case you can do a dirrect compaire on number of cores in this case the 448 Wins by quite a bit. But if you can wait a few weeks for the 600 series to hit the shelves you might get better prices on these "older" ones.

Thent

 

[Rockdpm]

yep, wait for NVIDIA's new CUDA Packing Architecture "kepler" you will have better options for around the same price