GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB vs GeForce 9600 GT 1GB

Intro

Compare those specs to the GeForce 9600 GT 1GB, which has core clock speeds of 650 MHz on the GPU, and 900 MHz on the 1024 MB of GDDR3 memory. It features 64 SPUs along with 32 Texture Address Units and 16 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB		90 Watts
GeForce 9600 GT 1GB		95 Watts
	Difference: 5 Watts (6%)

Memory Bandwidth

Both cards have the exact same bandwidth, so theoretically they should have identical performance. (explain)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB is much (more or less 50%) more effective at texture filtering than the GeForce 9600 GT 1GB. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB		31200 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9600 GT 1GB		20800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 10400 (50%)

Pixel Rate

Both cards have exactly the same pixel fill rate, so in theory they should perform equally good at at full screen anti-aliasing, and be capable of handling the same screen resolutions. (explain)

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 data (in units of megabytes per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface within a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the card's interface width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels the graphics card could possibly record to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is worked out by multiplying the number of ROPs by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel fill rate is also dependant on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the maximum fill rate.