GeForce 9600 GT 512MB vs Radeon HD 6670 (OEM)

Intro

Compare that to the Radeon HD 6670 (OEM), which features a clock frequency of 800 MHz and a GDDR5 memory speed of 1000 MHz. It also features a 128-bit memory bus, and uses a 40 nm design. It is made up of 480 SPUs, 24 TAUs, and 8 ROPs.

(No game benchmarks for this combination yet.)

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 6670 (OEM)		63 Watts
GeForce 9600 GT 512MB		95 Watts
	Difference: 32 Watts (51%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the Radeon HD 6670 (OEM) is 11% quicker than the GeForce 9600 GT 512MB in general, due to its greater bandwidth. (explain)

Radeon HD 6670 (OEM)		64000 MB/sec
GeForce 9600 GT 512MB		57600 MB/sec
	Difference: 6400 (11%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9600 GT 512MB will be a little bit (about 8%) better at texture filtering than the Radeon HD 6670 (OEM). (explain)

GeForce 9600 GT 512MB		20800 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 6670 (OEM)		19200 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 1600 (8%)

Pixel Rate

If running with a high screen resolution is important to you, then the GeForce 9600 GT 512MB is the winner, by a large margin. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GT 512MB		10400 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 6670 (OEM)		6400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 4000 (63%)

Please note that the above 'benchmarks' are all just theoretical - the results were calculated based on the card's specifications, and real-world performance may (and probably will) vary at least a bit.

Price Comparison

Specifications

Memory Bandwidth: Memory bandwidth is the largest amount of data (counted in MB per second) that can be transferred across the external memory interface in a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR type memory, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the bandwidth is, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that can be applied in one second. This number is calculated by multiplying the total amount of texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The better this number, the better the video card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels applied per second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels that the graphics chip can possibly record to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the number of ROPs by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel rate is also dependant on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the max fill rate.