GeForce GTX 280 vs GeForce GTX 660

Intro

Compare those specs to the GeForce GTX 660, which features core speeds of 980 MHz on the GPU, and 1502 MHz on the 2048 MB of GDDR5 memory. It features 960 SPUs along with 80 Texture Address Units and 24 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 660		140 Watts
GeForce GTX 280		236 Watts
	Difference: 96 Watts (69%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the GeForce GTX 660 should be a bit faster than the GeForce GTX 280 overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 660		144192 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 280		141696 MB/sec
	Difference: 2496 (2%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 660 will be a lot (approximately 63%) faster with regards to AF than the GeForce GTX 280. (explain)

GeForce GTX 660		78400 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 280		48160 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 30240 (63%)

Pixel Rate

If running with lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 660 is a better choice, and very much so. (explain)

GeForce GTX 660		23520 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 280		19264 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 4256 (22%)

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 max amount of information (in units of MB per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface in a second. It's calculated by multiplying the interface width by the speed of its memory. If it uses DDR type RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 once 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, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that can be applied in one second. This figure is calculated by multiplying the total amount of texture units of the card by the core 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 maximum number of pixels that the graphics card can possibly write to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is worked out by multiplying the number of Render Output Units by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel fill rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the maximum fill rate.