GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2 vs GeForce 9400 GT 256MB

Intro

Compare those specs to the GeForce 9400 GT 256MB, which makes use of a 65 nm design. nVidia has set the core frequency at 550 MHz. The GDDR2 RAM is set to run at a frequency of 400 MHz on this particular card. It features 16 SPUs along with 8 TAUs and 4 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2		47 Watts
GeForce 9400 GT 256MB		50 Watts
	Difference: 3 Watts (6%)

Memory Bandwidth

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

Texel Rate

The GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2 is much (approximately 96%) faster with regards to AF than the GeForce 9400 GT 256MB. (explain)

GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2		8640 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9400 GT 256MB		4400 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 4240 (96%)

Pixel Rate

If running with lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2 is the winner, by a large margin. (explain)

GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2		4320 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9400 GT 256MB		2200 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 2120 (96%)

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 (counted in MB per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface in a second. It 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 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels that the graphics card could possibly record to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.