GeForce GTX 850M vs GeForce GTX 950M

Intro

Compare that to the GeForce GTX 950M, which has a GPU core clock speed of 914 MHz, and 2048 MB of DDR3 memory running at 1000 MHz through a 128-bit bus. It also is comprised of 640 SPUs, 40 Texture Address Units, and 16 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Benchmarks

These are real-world performance benchmarks that were submitted by Hardware Compare users. The scores seen here are the average of all benchmarks submitted for each respective test and hardware.

3DMark Fire Strike Graphics Score

GeForce GTX 850M		3340 points
GeForce GTX 950M		3330 points
	Difference: 10 (0%)

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 850M		40 Watts
GeForce GTX 950M		55 Watts
	Difference: 15 Watts (38%)

Memory Bandwidth

Both cards have the exact same memory bandwidth, so theoretically they should have the same performance. (explain)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 950M will be a small bit (more or less 4%) better at texture filtering than the GeForce GTX 850M. (explain)

GeForce GTX 950M		36560 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 850M		35040 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 1520 (4%)

Pixel Rate

If using lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 950M is the winner, but it probably won't make a huge difference. (explain)

GeForce GTX 950M		14624 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 850M		14016 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 608 (4%)

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 information (counted in megabytes per second) that can be transferred across the external memory interface within a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the bus width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the bandwidth is, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels that the graphics chip could possibly write to the local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the amount of Raster Operations Pipelines by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel output rate also depends on lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the max fill rate.