GeForce 9600 GT 1GB vs GeForce 9800 GT 512MB

Intro

Compare that to the GeForce 9800 GT 512MB, which uses a 65/55 nm design. nVidia has set the core speed at 600 MHz. The GDDR3 RAM runs at a speed of 900 MHz on this particular model. It features 112 SPUs along with 56 Texture Address Units and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9600 GT 1GB		95 Watts
GeForce 9800 GT 512MB		105 Watts
	Difference: 10 Watts (11%)

Memory Bandwidth

Both cards have the exact same memory bandwidth, so in theory they should have the same performance. (explain)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9800 GT 512MB will be a lot (about 62%) better at texture filtering than the GeForce 9600 GT 1GB. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GT 512MB		33600 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9600 GT 1GB		20800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 12800 (62%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce 9600 GT 1GB is a bit (more or less 8%) better at anti-aliasing than the GeForce 9800 GT 512MB, and will be capable of handling higher resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GT 1GB		10400 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9800 GT 512MB		9600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 800 (8%)

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 maximum amount of data (counted in megabytes per second) that can be transported across the external memory interface in a second. It is worked out by multiplying the interface width by its memory speed. If it uses DDR type memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the bandwidth is, 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 can be processed per second. This number is calculated by multiplying the total number of texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The better this number, 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 amount of pixels that the graphics chip can possibly write to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the amount of ROPs by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as 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 potential to get to the max fill rate.