GeForce 9600 GSO ASUS 512 vs GeForce 9800 GT 512MB

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce 9800 GT 512MB, which comes with a core clock frequency of 600 MHz and a GDDR3 memory frequency of 900 MHz. It also uses a 256-bit bus, and makes use of a 65/55 nm design. It features 112 SPUs, 56 TAUs, and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9600 GSO ASUS 512		84 Watts
GeForce 9800 GT 512MB		105 Watts
	Difference: 21 Watts (25%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically, the GeForce 9800 GT 512MB should be quite a bit faster than the GeForce 9600 GSO ASUS 512 in general. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GT 512MB		57600 MB/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO ASUS 512		16000 MB/sec
	Difference: 41600 (260%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9800 GT 512MB should be much (more or less 27%) faster with regards to anisotropic filtering than the GeForce 9600 GSO ASUS 512. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GT 512MB		33600 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO ASUS 512		26400 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 7200 (27%)

Pixel Rate

If running with high levels of AA is important to you, then the GeForce 9800 GT 512MB is the winner, by a large margin. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GT 512MB		9600 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO ASUS 512		6600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 3000 (45%)

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 maximum amount of information (in units of MB per second) that can be transported over the external memory interface in one second. It is calculated by multiplying the bus width by the speed of its memory. If it uses DDR type RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels that the graphics chip can possibly write to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is worked out by multiplying the number of Render Output Units 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 rate also depends on quite a few other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the max fill rate.