GeForce GTX 280 vs GeForce GTX 650

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GTX 650, which has core speeds of 1058 MHz on the GPU, and 1250 MHz on the 1024 MB of GDDR5 RAM. It features 384 SPUs as well as 32 Texture Address Units and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 650		64 Watts
GeForce GTX 280		236 Watts
	Difference: 172 Watts (269%)

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the GeForce GTX 280 should in theory be much superior to the GeForce GTX 650 in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 280		141696 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 650		80000 MB/sec
	Difference: 61696 (77%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 280 is much (approximately 42%) better at AF than the GeForce GTX 650. (explain)

GeForce GTX 280		48160 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 650		33856 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 14304 (42%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 280 should be a little bit (about 14%) more effective at FSAA than the GeForce GTX 650, and also will be able to handle higher screen resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

GeForce GTX 280		19264 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 650		16928 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 2336 (14%)

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 (in units of megabytes per second) that can be moved over the external memory interface within a second. It's calculated by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory clock speed. If the card has DDR RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that are applied 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 graphics card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels applied in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the graphics card could possibly record to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the number of ROPs by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel rate is also dependant on lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the max fill rate.