GeForce 9600 GT 512MB vs Radeon HD 3850 1GB

Intro

Compare that to the Radeon HD 3850 1GB, which has a GPU core clock speed of 668 MHz, and 1024 MB of GDDR3 memory running at 828 MHz through a 256-bit bus. It also is comprised of 320(64x5) SPUs, 16 TAUs, and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 3850 1GB		75 Watts
GeForce 9600 GT 512MB		95 Watts
	Difference: 20 Watts (27%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce 9600 GT 512MB will be 9% quicker than the Radeon HD 3850 1GB overall, due to its higher data rate. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GT 512MB		57600 MB/sec
Radeon HD 3850 1GB		52992 MB/sec
	Difference: 4608 (9%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9600 GT 512MB should be quite a bit (more or less 95%) better at AF than the Radeon HD 3850 1GB. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GT 512MB		20800 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 3850 1GB		10688 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 10112 (95%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon HD 3850 1GB will be just a bit (more or less 3%) faster with regards to AA than the GeForce 9600 GT 512MB, and also capable of handling higher screen resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

Radeon HD 3850 1GB		10688 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9600 GT 512MB		10400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 288 (3%)

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 (counted in megabytes per second) that can be transported over the external memory interface in one second. It's calculated by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory clock speed. If the card has DDR type memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that can be processed in one second. This figure is worked out by multiplying the total amount of texture units of the card by the core clock speed of the chip. The higher this number, 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 graphics card could possibly write to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is worked out by multiplying the amount of Raster Operations Pipelines by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel fill rate also depends 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 maximum fill rate.