GeForce 8600 GS (OEM) vs Radeon R7 250X 2GB

Intro

Compare all of that to the Radeon R7 250X 2GB, which features a clock frequency of 1000 MHz and a GDDR5 memory frequency of 1125 MHz. It also features a 128-bit memory bus, and uses a 28 nm design. It is made up of 640 SPUs, 40 TAUs, and 16 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GS (OEM)		47 Watts
Radeon R7 250X 2GB		95 Watts
	Difference: 48 Watts (102%)

Memory Bandwidth

The Radeon R7 250X 2GB should theoretically be a lot faster than the GeForce 8600 GS (OEM) overall. (explain)

Radeon R7 250X 2GB		72000 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GS (OEM)		12800 MB/sec
	Difference: 59200 (463%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon R7 250X 2GB should be much (approximately 363%) better at texture filtering than the GeForce 8600 GS (OEM). (explain)

Radeon R7 250X 2GB		40000 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GS (OEM)		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 31360 (363%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon R7 250X 2GB is a lot (about 270%) more effective at FSAA than the GeForce 8600 GS (OEM), and also should be capable of handling higher resolutions without slowing down too much. (explain)

Radeon R7 250X 2GB		16000 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GS (OEM)		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 11680 (270%)

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 data (measured in megabytes per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface within a second. It's worked out by multiplying the interface width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that are processed per second. This is calculated by multiplying the total amount of texture units by the core speed of the chip. The higher this number, the better the video card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels processed per second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the graphics card can possibly write to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the number of Raster Operations Pipelines by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel fill 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 get to the maximum fill rate.