GeForce GTX 460 1GB vs GeForce GTX 850M

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GTX 850M, which has GPU core speed of 876 MHz, and 2048 MB of DDR3 RAM set to run at 1000 MHz through a 128-bit bus. It also features 640 SPUs, 40 Texture Address Units, and 16 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 850M		40 Watts
GeForce GTX 460 1GB		160 Watts
	Difference: 120 Watts (300%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GTX 460 1GB, in theory, should perform quite a bit faster than the GeForce GTX 850M in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 1GB		115200 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 850M		32000 MB/sec
	Difference: 83200 (260%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 460 1GB will be a little bit (more or less 8%) better at AF than the GeForce GTX 850M. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 1GB		37800 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 850M		35040 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 2760 (8%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 460 1GB will be much (about 54%) faster with regards to anti-aliasing than the GeForce GTX 850M, and also should be capable of handling higher screen resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 1GB		21600 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 850M		14016 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 7584 (54%)

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 information (in units of MB per second) that can be transferred across the external memory interface in one second. It is worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by the speed of its memory. If the card has DDR memory, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the bandwidth is, 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 processed in one second. This number is calculated by multiplying the total texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The higher the texel rate, the better the video card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels processed in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the graphics card could possibly write to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the amount of ROPs by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka 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 - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the max fill rate.