GeForce 9800 GT 512MB vs GeForce GTX 280

Intro

Compare those specs to the GeForce GTX 280, which features a clock frequency of 602 MHz and a GDDR3 memory speed of 1107 MHz. It also uses a 512-bit memory bus, and uses a 65 nm design. It is comprised of 240 SPUs, 80 Texture Address Units, and 32 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9800 GT 512MB		105 Watts
GeForce GTX 280		236 Watts
	Difference: 131 Watts (125%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce GTX 280 should be 146% faster than the GeForce 9800 GT 512MB in general, because of its higher data rate. (explain)

GeForce GTX 280		141696 MB/sec
GeForce 9800 GT 512MB		57600 MB/sec
	Difference: 84096 (146%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 280 is quite a bit (about 43%) better at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce 9800 GT 512MB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 280		48160 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9800 GT 512MB		33600 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 14560 (43%)

Pixel Rate

If running with a high screen resolution is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 280 is superior to the GeForce 9800 GT 512MB, by far. (explain)

GeForce GTX 280		19264 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9800 GT 512MB		9600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 9664 (101%)

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 information (measured in MB per second) that can be transported across the external memory interface within a second. It's worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory speed. If it uses DDR RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the better 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 can be processed per second. This figure is calculated by multiplying the total number of texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, the better the graphics card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels applied per second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels that the graphics chip can 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 ROPs by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel output rate also depends on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.