GeForce 9600 GT 512MB vs Radeon HD 4730

Intro

Compare that to the Radeon HD 4730, which uses a 55 nm design. AMD has clocked the core frequency at 700 MHz. The GDDR5 memory runs at a speed of 900 MHz on this card. It features 640(128x5) SPUs as well as 32 TAUs and 8 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9600 GT 512MB		95 Watts
Radeon HD 4730		140 Watts
	Difference: 45 Watts (47%)

Memory Bandwidth

Both cards have exactly the same bandwidth, so in theory they should perform the same. (explain)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 4730 is a small bit (more or less 8%) more effective at texture filtering than the GeForce 9600 GT 512MB. (explain)

Radeon HD 4730		22400 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9600 GT 512MB		20800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 1600 (8%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce 9600 GT 512MB should be much (more or less 86%) better at AA than the Radeon HD 4730, and also capable of handling higher resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GT 512MB		10400 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4730		5600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 4800 (86%)

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 (counted in megabytes per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface in one second. It's worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR memory, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better 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 number of texture map elements (texels) that can be applied in one second. This is calculated by multiplying the total number of texture units by the core speed of the chip. The higher this number, the better the card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels per second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels the graphics card could possibly write to the local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the amount of Raster Operations Pipelines by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel fill rate is also dependant on lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.