GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB vs GeForce GTX 650

Intro

Compare that 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 TAUs and 16 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 650		64 Watts
GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB		90 Watts
	Difference: 26 Watts (41%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GTX 650, in theory, should perform quite a bit faster than the GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 650		80000 MB/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB		57600 MB/sec
	Difference: 22400 (39%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 650 is just a bit (about 9%) better at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 650		33856 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB		31200 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 2656 (9%)

Pixel Rate

If running with a high resolution is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 650 is superior to the GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB, and very much so. (explain)

GeForce GTX 650		16928 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB		10400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 6528 (63%)

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 max amount of information (measured in megabytes per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface in a second. It is worked out by multiplying the bus width by its memory clock speed. In the case of DDR type RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum amount of texture map elements (texels) that are applied per second. This is worked out by multiplying the total texture units by the core speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, the better the video card will be at 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 write to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the number of ROPs by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel rate also depends on quite a few other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the maximum fill rate.