GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3 vs Radeon HD 5670

Intro

Compare those specifications to the Radeon HD 5670, which features a core clock frequency of 775 MHz and a GDDR5 memory frequency of 1000 MHz. It also uses a 128-bit bus, and uses a 40 nm design. It features 400(80x5) SPUs, 20 TAUs, and 8 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3		47 Watts
Radeon HD 5670		61 Watts
	Difference: 14 Watts (30%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the Radeon HD 5670 should perform quite a bit faster than the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3 overall. (explain)

Radeon HD 5670		64000 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3		22400 MB/sec
	Difference: 41600 (186%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 5670 should be quite a bit (about 79%) better at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3. (explain)

Radeon HD 5670		15500 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 6860 (79%)

Pixel Rate

If using a high resolution is important to you, then the Radeon HD 5670 is the winner, and very much so. (explain)

Radeon HD 5670		6200 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 1880 (44%)

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 largest amount of information (in units of megabytes per second) that can be transported past the external memory interface within a second. It is worked out by multiplying the interface width by its memory clock speed. If the card has DDR memory, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the card's 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 texture map elements (texels) that are applied per second. This number is worked out by multiplying the total texture units by the core speed of the chip. The better this number, the better the 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 most pixels that the graphics chip could possibly write to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the amount of Raster Operations Pipelines by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel rate also depends on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the maximum fill rate.