GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3 vs GeForce GTX 950M

Intro

Compare those specs to the GeForce GTX 950M, which features a core clock speed of 914 MHz and a DDR3 memory frequency of 1000 MHz. It also uses a 128-bit memory bus, and uses a 28 nm design. It features 640 SPUs, 40 TAUs, and 16 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
GeForce GTX 950M		55 Watts
	Difference: 8 Watts (17%)

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the GeForce GTX 950M should in theory be much better than the GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3 overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 950M		32000 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3		22400 MB/sec
	Difference: 9600 (43%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 950M should be a lot (more or less 323%) better at texture filtering than the GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3. (explain)

GeForce GTX 950M		36560 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 27920 (323%)

Pixel Rate

If running with a high screen resolution is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 950M is superior to the GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3, by a large margin. (explain)

GeForce GTX 950M		14624 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 10304 (239%)

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 data (in units of MB per second) that can be transported across the external memory interface within a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR type memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels that the graphics card can possibly record to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the number of Render Output Units by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel output rate is also dependant on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the max fill rate.