GeForce GTX 965M vs Radeon R9 M280X

If you are going to buy a new graphics card and are choosing between GeForce GTX 965M and Radeon R9 M280X, there are a couple of things to consider. Cards with more VRAM in general perform better and allow you to play on higher graphics settings. Size also makes a difference. A model with a large heatsink can occupy up to three expansion slots on a motherboard. Be sure you have enough room in your PC case. When comparing GPUs with different architectures, more processing cores and even higher TFLOPS will not always translate to better performance. To help you decide which GPU you need, we have measured frame rates in a number of popular games. For more on how the GeForce GTX 965M stacks up against Radeon R9 M280X, check out specs charts below.

GeForce GTX 965M and Radeon R9 M280X are Laptop Graphics Cards

Note: GeForce GTX 965M and Radeon R9 M280X are only used in laptop graphics. They have lower GPU clock speed compared to the desktop variant, which results in lower power consumption, but also 10-30% lower gaming performance. Check available laptop models with GeForce GTX 965M or Radeon R9 M280X here:

Main Specs

  GeForce GTX 965M Radeon R9 M280X
Interface MXM-B (3.0) PCIe 3.0 x16
Supplementary power connectors None
Memory type GDDR5 Not Listed
Maximum RAM amount 4 GB
Display Connectors No outputs No outputs
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  • GeForce GTX 965M is connected by MXM-B (3.0), and Radeon R9 M280X uses PCIe 3.0 x16 interface.
  • Both cards are used in Laptops.
  • GeForce GTX 965M is build with Maxwell architecture, and Radeon R9 M280X - with GCN.
  • Core clock speed of GeForce GTX 965M is 44 MHz higher, than Radeon R9 M280X.
  • GeForce GTX 965M and Radeon R9 M280X are manufactured by 28 nm process technology.

Game benchmarks

high / 1080p 20−22 2−3
ultra / 1080p 12−14 1−2
QHD / 1440p 6−7 0−1
4K / 2160p 5−6
low / 720p 35−40 14−16
medium / 1080p 24−27 4−5
The average gaming FPS of GeForce GTX 965M in Assassin's Creed Odyssey is 380% more, than Radeon R9 M280X.

Full Specs

  GeForce GTX 965M Radeon R9 M280X
Architecture Maxwell GCN
Code name N16E-GS, N16E-GR Saturn XT
Type Laptop Laptop
Release date 5 January 2015 1 February 2015
Pipelines 1024 896
Core clock speed 944 MHz 900 MHz
Boost Clock 950 / 1151 MHz
Transistor count 2,940 million 2,080 million
Manufacturing process technology 28 nm 28 nm
Texture fill rate 73.60 61.60
Floating-point performance 2,355 gflops 1,792 gflops
Memory bus width 128 Bit
Memory clock speed 2500 MHz
Memory bandwidth 80 GB/s 96 GB/s
Shared memory - -
G-SYNC support +
DirectX 12 (12_1)
Shader Model 6.4 6.3
OpenGL 4.5 4.4
OpenCL 1.1 Not Listed
Vulkan 1.1
CUDA +
FreeSync +
CUDA cores 1024
Bus support PCI Express 3.0 Not Listed
SLI options +
HDMI +
Bitcoin / BTC (SHA256) 226 Mh/s
Laptop size large large
DisplayPort Multimode (DP++) support +
H.264, VC1, MPEG2 1080p video decoder +
Optimus +
HD3D +
PowerTune +
DualGraphics +
ZeroCore +
Switchable graphics +
Mantle +
GameStream +
GeForce ShadowPlay +
GPU Boost 2.0
GameWorks +
BatteryBoost +
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