GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3 vs GeForce GTX 660

Intro

Compare all that to the GeForce GTX 660, which has a GPU core clock speed of 980 MHz, and 2048 MB of GDDR5 RAM set to run at 1502 MHz through a 192-bit bus. It also is comprised of 960 Stream Processors, 80 TAUs, and 24 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3		47 Watts
GeForce GTX 660		140 Watts
	Difference: 93 Watts (198%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce GTX 660 should perform a lot faster than the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3 in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 660		144192 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3		22400 MB/sec
	Difference: 121792 (544%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 660 will be much (about 807%) better at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3. (explain)

GeForce GTX 660		78400 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 69760 (807%)

Pixel Rate

If running with a high resolution is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 660 is superior to the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3, and very much so. (explain)

GeForce GTX 660		23520 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 19200 (444%)

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 largest amount of information (measured in MB per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface within a second. It is calculated by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory speed. If it uses DDR type memory, it should be multiplied by 2 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, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum amount of texture map elements (texels) that can be processed in one second. This figure is calculated by multiplying the total texture units of the card by the core 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 in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels that the graphics chip can possibly record to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel 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 potential to get to the max fill rate.