GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2 vs Radeon HD 5770

Intro

Compare those specifications to the Radeon HD 5770, which features a GPU core clock speed of 850 MHz, and 1024 MB of GDDR5 memory running at 1200 MHz through a 128-bit bus. It also features 800(160x5) Stream Processors, 40 Texture Address Units, and 16 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		47 Watts
Radeon HD 5770		108 Watts
	Difference: 61 Watts (130%)

Memory Bandwidth

The Radeon HD 5770 should in theory be much faster than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2 in general. (explain)

Radeon HD 5770		76800 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		12800 MB/sec
	Difference: 64000 (500%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 5770 is a lot (more or less 294%) more effective at texture filtering than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2. (explain)

Radeon HD 5770		34000 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 25360 (294%)

Pixel Rate

If using high levels of AA is important to you, then the Radeon HD 5770 is superior to the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2, and very much so. (explain)

Radeon HD 5770		13600 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 9280 (215%)

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 largest amount of data (in units of MB per second) that can be transported past the external memory interface in one second. It is worked out by multiplying the bus width by its memory speed. In the case of DDR type RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the bandwidth is, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels that the graphics chip could possibly record to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the number of Render Output Units by the the core speed of the card. 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 fill rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.