GeForce GTX 280 vs GeForce GTX 560

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GTX 560, which uses a 40 nm design. nVidia has set the core frequency at 810 MHz. The GDDR5 RAM runs at a speed of 1001 MHz on this model. It features 336 SPUs along with 56 Texture Address Units and 32 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 560		150 Watts
GeForce GTX 280		236 Watts
	Difference: 86 Watts (57%)

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the GeForce GTX 280 should in theory be a bit better than the GeForce GTX 560 in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 280		141696 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 560		128128 MB/sec
	Difference: 13568 (11%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 280 should be a little bit (more or less 6%) more effective at AF than the GeForce GTX 560. (explain)

GeForce GTX 280		48160 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 560		45360 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 2800 (6%)

Pixel Rate

If running with a high screen resolution is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 560 is the winner, and very much so. (explain)

GeForce GTX 560		25920 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 280		19264 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 6656 (35%)

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 maximum amount of data (in units of megabytes per second) that can be transferred across the external memory interface in a second. The number is worked out by multiplying the bus width by the speed of its memory. If it uses DDR type RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the memory bandwidth, the better 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 per second. This is worked out by multiplying the total number of texture units of the card by the core clock speed of the chip. The higher this number, the better the card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels applied in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the video card could possibly write to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the number of ROPs by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel fill 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.