GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3 vs Radeon R9 M280X

Intro

Compare those specs to the Radeon R9 M280X, which uses a 28 nm design. AMD has clocked the core frequency at 900 MHz. The GDDR5 RAM is set to run at a frequency of 1375 MHz on this card. It features 896 SPUs as well as 56 TAUs and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3		47 Watts
Radeon R9 M280X		75 Watts
	Difference: 28 Watts (60%)

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the Radeon R9 M280X should theoretically be quite a bit superior to the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3 in general. (explain)

Radeon R9 M280X		88000 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3		22400 MB/sec
	Difference: 65600 (293%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon R9 M280X should be a lot (about 483%) more effective at AF than the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3. (explain)

Radeon R9 M280X		50400 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 41760 (483%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon R9 M280X will be quite a bit (approximately 233%) more effective at FSAA than the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3, and also able to handle higher resolutions better. (explain)

Radeon R9 M280X		14400 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 10080 (233%)

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 maximum amount of data (in units of MB per second) that can be transferred past the external memory interface in a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the bus width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR type memory, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the 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 amount of texture map elements (texels) that can be applied per second. This figure is worked out by multiplying the total amount of texture units by the core clock 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 in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the graphics card could possibly write to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the number of colour ROPs by the the core clock speed. 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 lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.