GeForce 8600 GT 1GB DDR2 vs GeForce GTX 560

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GTX 560, which uses a 40 nm design. nVidia has set the core speed at 810 MHz. The GDDR5 memory is set to run at a frequency of 1001 MHz on this particular model. It features 336 SPUs as well as 56 Texture Address Units and 32 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GT 1GB DDR2		47 Watts
GeForce GTX 560		150 Watts
	Difference: 103 Watts (219%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce GTX 560 should perform a lot faster than the GeForce 8600 GT 1GB DDR2 overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 560		128128 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 1GB DDR2		12800 MB/sec
	Difference: 115328 (901%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 560 should be quite a bit (approximately 425%) better at AF than the GeForce 8600 GT 1GB DDR2. (explain)

GeForce GTX 560		45360 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 1GB DDR2		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 36720 (425%)

Pixel Rate

If using a high screen resolution is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 560 is the winner, by a large margin. (explain)

GeForce GTX 560		25920 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 1GB DDR2		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 21600 (500%)

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: Bandwidth is the max amount of data (counted in megabytes per second) that can be transported past the external memory interface in one second. It's calculated by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory speed. If the card has DDR type RAM, it must 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 anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the graphics card could 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 colour ROPs by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel rate also depends on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the maximum fill rate.