GeForce 9600 GSO 384MB vs Radeon HD 4670 512MB

Intro

Compare those specifications to the Radeon HD 4670 512MB, which comes with a core clock speed of 750 MHz and a GDDR4/GDDR3/DDR3/DDR2 memory speed of 1000 MHz. It also makes use of a 128-bit memory bus, and makes use of a 55 nm design. It is made up of 320(64x5) SPUs, 32 Texture Address Units, and 8 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 4670 512MB		70 Watts
GeForce 9600 GSO 384MB		84 Watts
	Difference: 14 Watts (20%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce 9600 GSO 384MB should be just a bit faster than the Radeon HD 4670 512MB in general. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GSO 384MB		38400 MB/sec
Radeon HD 4670 512MB		32000 MB/sec
	Difference: 6400 (20%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9600 GSO 384MB should be a little bit (about 10%) more effective at AF than the Radeon HD 4670 512MB. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GSO 384MB		26400 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 4670 512MB		24000 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 2400 (10%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce 9600 GSO 384MB should be a little bit (approximately 10%) faster with regards to full screen anti-aliasing than the Radeon HD 4670 512MB, and will be able to handle higher resolutions better. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GSO 384MB		6600 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4670 512MB		6000 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 600 (10%)

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 (measured in MB per second) that can be transported past the external memory interface within a second. It's worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory speed. If it uses DDR memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that can be applied per second. This figure is calculated by multiplying the total texture units of the card by the core clock 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 amount of pixels the video card could possibly record to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel fill rate also depends on quite a few other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the maximum fill rate.