GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB vs GeForce GTS 250 1GB

Intro

Compare all of that to the GeForce GTS 250 1GB, which features core clock speeds of 738 MHz on the GPU, and 1100 MHz on the 1024 MB of GDDR3 memory. It features 128 SPUs along with 64 Texture Address Units and 16 ROPs.

(No game benchmarks for this combination yet.)

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB		90 Watts
GeForce GTS 250 1GB		145 Watts
	Difference: 55 Watts (61%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GTS 250 1GB should in theory be much faster than the GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB in general. (explain)

GeForce GTS 250 1GB		70400 MB/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB		57600 MB/sec
	Difference: 12800 (22%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTS 250 1GB should be much (about 51%) more effective at AF than the GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB. (explain)

GeForce GTS 250 1GB		47232 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB		31200 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 16032 (51%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTS 250 1GB will be a bit (more or less 14%) more effective at FSAA than the GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB, and able to handle higher screen resolutions better. (explain)

GeForce GTS 250 1GB		11808 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB		10400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 1408 (14%)

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 (in units of megabytes per second) that can be transported past the external memory interface in one second. It's worked out by multiplying the bus 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 better the bandwidth is, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels the graphics card can possibly write to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the amount of Render Output Units by the the core clock speed. 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 also depends on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the max fill rate.