GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3 vs GeForce GTX 1060 3GB

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GTX 1060 3GB, which comes with a GPU core clock speed of 1506 MHz, and 3072 MB of GDDR5 RAM running at 2000 MHz through a 192-bit bus. It also is made up of 1152 SPUs, 72 TAUs, and 48 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3		47 Watts
GeForce GTX 1060 3GB		120 Watts
	Difference: 73 Watts (155%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce GTX 1060 3GB is 778% quicker than the GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3 overall, due to its greater bandwidth. (explain)

GeForce GTX 1060 3GB		196608 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3		22400 MB/sec
	Difference: 174208 (778%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 1060 3GB is a lot (about 1155%) more effective at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3. (explain)

GeForce GTX 1060 3GB		108432 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 99792 (1155%)

Pixel Rate

If running with a high resolution is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 1060 3GB is a better choice, and very much so. (explain)

GeForce GTX 1060 3GB		72288 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 67968 (1573%)

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 max amount of information (in units of megabytes per second) that can be transferred across the external memory interface in one second. It is calculated by multiplying the bus width by the speed of its memory. If the card has DDR RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the card's 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 amount of texture map elements (texels) that can be processed per second. This number is calculated by multiplying the total amount of texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The higher the texel rate, the better the graphics card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels processed in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels that the graphics chip can possibly write to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the number of Raster Operations Pipelines by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel output rate is also dependant on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the max fill rate.