GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3 vs Radeon HD 7870 XT

Intro

Compare those specs to the Radeon HD 7870 XT, which features a core clock frequency of 925 MHz and a GDDR5 memory speed of 1500 MHz. It also features a 256-bit memory bus, and uses a 28 nm design. It is comprised of 1536 SPUs, 96 Texture Address Units, and 32 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3		47 Watts
Radeon HD 7870 XT		185 Watts
	Difference: 138 Watts (294%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the Radeon HD 7870 XT will be 757% quicker than the GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3 overall, because of its higher data rate. (explain)

Radeon HD 7870 XT		192000 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3		22400 MB/sec
	Difference: 169600 (757%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 7870 XT will be much (about 928%) better at texture filtering than the GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3. (explain)

Radeon HD 7870 XT		88800 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 80160 (928%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon HD 7870 XT should be quite a bit (approximately 585%) faster with regards to AA than the GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3, and also able to handle higher screen resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

Radeon HD 7870 XT		29600 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 25280 (585%)

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 (measured in megabytes per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface in one second. It's calculated by multiplying the card's interface width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. 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 amount of texture map elements (texels) that can be 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 this number, the better the graphics card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels that the graphics chip could possibly record 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 rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the maximum fill rate.