GeForce 9600 GSO 384MB vs GeForce GTX 960M

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GTX 960M, which comes with a core clock speed of 1096 MHz and a GDDR5 memory frequency of 1000 MHz. It also features a 128-bit bus, and makes use of a 28 nm design. It is made up of 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 GTX 960M		65 Watts
GeForce 9600 GSO 384MB		84 Watts
	Difference: 19 Watts (29%)

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the GeForce GTX 960M should theoretically be much superior to the GeForce 9600 GSO 384MB overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 960M		64000 MB/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 384MB		38400 MB/sec
	Difference: 25600 (67%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 960M is a lot (approximately 66%) more effective at texture filtering than the GeForce 9600 GSO 384MB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 960M		43840 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 384MB		26400 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 17440 (66%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 960M is quite a bit (about 166%) more effective at AA than the GeForce 9600 GSO 384MB, and also able to handle higher screen resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

GeForce GTX 960M		17536 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 384MB		6600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 10936 (166%)

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 largest amount of data (counted in MB per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface in a second. It is worked out by multiplying the bus width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR type RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum amount of texture map elements (texels) that can be applied in one second. This figure is calculated by multiplying the total number of texture units by the core 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 a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels the video card can possibly write to the local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. 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 potential to get to the max fill rate.