GeForce GTX 460 (OEM) vs GeForce GTX 660

Intro

Compare all that to the GeForce GTX 660, which features core speeds of 980 MHz on the GPU, and 1502 MHz on the 2048 MB of GDDR5 RAM. It features 960 SPUs along with 80 TAUs and 24 ROPs.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 660		140 Watts
GeForce GTX 460 (OEM)		150 Watts
	Difference: 10 Watts (7%)

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the GeForce GTX 660 should in theory be much better than the GeForce GTX 460 (OEM) overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 660		144192 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 460 (OEM)		108800 MB/sec
	Difference: 35392 (33%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 660 will be much (more or less 115%) more effective at texture filtering than the GeForce GTX 460 (OEM). (explain)

GeForce GTX 660		78400 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 460 (OEM)		36400 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 42000 (115%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 660 should be a bit (more or less 13%) better at full screen anti-aliasing than the GeForce GTX 460 (OEM), and will be capable of handling higher resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

GeForce GTX 660		23520 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 460 (OEM)		20800 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 2720 (13%)

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 (measured in megabytes per second) that can be moved over the external memory interface in one second. It's calculated by multiplying the card's bus width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR type RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that are processed in one second. This number is worked out by multiplying the total texture units by the core clock speed of the chip. The higher the texel rate, the better the 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 maximum number of pixels that the graphics chip could possibly record to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is worked out by multiplying the amount of Raster Operations Pipelines by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel fill rate also depends on lots of other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.