GeForce 8800 GT 256MB vs GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB

Intro

Compare all of that to the GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB, which features a GPU core clock speed of 550 MHz, and 1536 MB of GDDR3 RAM running at 800 MHz through a 192-bit bus. It also is made up of 96 SPUs, 48 Texture Address Units, and 12 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB		84 Watts
GeForce 8800 GT 256MB		105 Watts
	Difference: 21 Watts (25%)

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the GeForce 8800 GT 256MB should in theory be a bit superior to the GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB in general. (explain)

GeForce 8800 GT 256MB		44800 MB/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB		38400 MB/sec
	Difference: 6400 (17%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 8800 GT 256MB should be quite a bit (more or less 27%) better at AF than the GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB. (explain)

GeForce 8800 GT 256MB		33600 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB		26400 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 7200 (27%)

Pixel Rate

If using a high screen resolution is important to you, then the GeForce 8800 GT 256MB is a better choice, and very much so. (explain)

GeForce 8800 GT 256MB		9600 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB		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: Bandwidth is the maximum amount of data (measured in MB per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface in one second. It's calculated by multiplying the card's bus width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR type RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum amount of texture map elements (texels) that can be processed in one second. This is worked out by multiplying the total number of texture units of the card by the core clock 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 a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the video card can possibly write to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the number of Raster Operations Pipelines by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel fill rate is also dependant on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.