GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2 vs Radeon HD 3650 512MB

Intro

Compare all of that to the Radeon HD 3650 512MB, which uses a 55 nm design. AMD has clocked the core speed at 725 MHz. The GDDR3 memory is set to run at a frequency of 800 MHz on this particular card. It features 120(24x5) SPUs as well as 8 Texture Address Units and 4 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		47 Watts
Radeon HD 3650 512MB		78 Watts
	Difference: 31 Watts (66%)

Memory Bandwidth

The Radeon HD 3650 512MB should theoretically perform a lot faster than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2 overall. (explain)

Radeon HD 3650 512MB		25600 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		12800 MB/sec
	Difference: 12800 (100%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2 is a lot (approximately 49%) more effective at texture filtering than the Radeon HD 3650 512MB. (explain)

GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		8640 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 3650 512MB		5800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 2840 (49%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2 will be quite a bit (about 49%) better at anti-aliasing than the Radeon HD 3650 512MB, and should be able to handle higher resolutions more effectively. (explain)

GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		4320 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 3650 512MB		2900 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 1420 (49%)

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 max amount of data (in units of megabytes per second) that can be transferred past the external memory interface within a second. It's worked out by multiplying the interface width by the speed of its memory. If it uses DDR type memory, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the bandwidth is, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that are applied in one second. This is worked out by multiplying the total amount of texture units by the core clock speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, the better the card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels processed per second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels that the graphics card could possibly write to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the amount of Render Output Units 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 rate also depends on lots of other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the max fill rate.