GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2 vs Radeon HD 7850

Intro

Compare all of that to the Radeon HD 7850, which makes use of a 28 nm design. AMD has clocked the core speed at 860 MHz. The GDDR5 memory runs at a frequency of 1200 MHz on this card. It features 1024 SPUs along with 64 TAUs and 32 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2		47 Watts
Radeon HD 7850		130 Watts
	Difference: 83 Watts (177%)

Memory Bandwidth

The Radeon HD 7850, in theory, should be quite a bit faster than the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2 overall. (explain)

Radeon HD 7850		153600 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2		12800 MB/sec
	Difference: 140800 (1100%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 7850 will be quite a bit (more or less 537%) more effective at AF than the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2. (explain)

Radeon HD 7850		55040 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 46400 (537%)

Pixel Rate

If using high levels of AA is important to you, then the Radeon HD 7850 is superior to the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2, by far. (explain)

Radeon HD 7850		27520 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 23200 (537%)

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 information (measured in megabytes per second) that can be transported past the external memory interface in a second. The number is worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory speed. If it uses DDR type RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the bandwidth is, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of 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 amount of Render Output Units by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel rate also depends on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the maximum fill rate.