GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2 vs GeForce GTX 850M

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GTX 850M, which has clock speeds of 876 MHz on the GPU, and 1000 MHz on the 2048 MB of DDR3 RAM. It features 640 SPUs along with 40 TAUs and 16 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 850M		40 Watts
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		47 Watts
	Difference: 7 Watts (18%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce GTX 850M will be 150% quicker than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2 overall, due to its greater bandwidth. (explain)

GeForce GTX 850M		32000 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		12800 MB/sec
	Difference: 19200 (150%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 850M will be quite a bit (more or less 306%) better at AF than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2. (explain)

GeForce GTX 850M		35040 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 26400 (306%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 850M is quite a bit (about 224%) better at full screen anti-aliasing than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2, and also will be capable of handling higher resolutions more effectively. (explain)

GeForce GTX 850M		14016 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 9696 (224%)

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 (in units of megabytes per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface within a second. It is worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory clock speed. In the case of DDR type memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels that the graphics chip can possibly record to its local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the amount of ROPs by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel rate is also dependant 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.