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GeForce 8600 GS (OEM) vs GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3

Intro

The GeForce 8600 GS (OEM) comes with a GPU clock speed of 540 MHz, and the 256 MB of DDR2 memory is set to run at 400 MHz through a 128-bit bus. It also features 32 SPUs, 16 Texture Address Units, and 8 ROPs.

Compare those specifications to the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3, which features core clock speeds of 540 MHz on the GPU, and 700 MHz on the 256 MB of GDDR3 memory. It features 32 SPUs as well as 16 Texture Address Units and 8 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Both cards have the same power consumption.

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3 should in theory be much better than the GeForce 8600 GS (OEM) overall. (explain)

GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3 22400 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GS (OEM) 12800 MB/sec
Difference: 9600 (75%)

Texel Rate

Both cards have the exact same texel fill rate, so theoretically they should be equally good at at AF. (explain)

Pixel Rate

Both cards have the exact same pixel rate, so in theory they should perform equally good at at AA, and be able to handle the same 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

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GeForce 8600 GS (OEM)

Amazon.com

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GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3

Amazon.com

Check prices at:

Please note that the price comparisons are based on search keywords - sometimes it might show cards with very similar names that are not exactly the same as the one chosen in the comparison. We do try to filter out the wrong results as best we can, though.

Specifications

Display Specifications

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Model GeForce 8600 GS (OEM) GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3
Manufacturer nVidia nVidia
Year April 2007 April 2007
Code Name G84 G84
Memory 256 MB 256 MB
Core Speed 540 MHz 540 MHz
Memory Speed 800 MHz 1400 MHz
Power (Max TDP) 47 watts 47 watts
Bandwidth 12800 MB/sec 22400 MB/sec
Texel Rate 8640 Mtexels/sec 8640 Mtexels/sec
Pixel Rate 4320 Mpixels/sec 4320 Mpixels/sec
Unified Shaders 32 32
Texture Mapping Units 16 16
Render Output Units 8 8
Bus Type DDR2 GDDR3
Bus Width 128-bit 128-bit
Fab Process 80 nm 80 nm
Transistors 289 million 289 million
Bus PCIe x16 PCIe x16
DirectX Version DirectX 10 DirectX 10
OpenGL Version OpenGL 3.0 OpenGL 3.0

Memory Bandwidth: Bandwidth is the maximum amount of data (measured in MB per second) that can be transferred past the external memory interface in one second. It's worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory speed. If the card has DDR RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the card's 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 is calculated by multiplying the total texture units by the core clock speed of the chip. The higher this number, the better the card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels processed in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the video card could possibly write to the local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the the card's clock speed. 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 quite a few other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the max fill rate.

Display Prices

Hide Prices

GeForce 8600 GS (OEM)

Amazon.com

Check prices at:

GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3

Amazon.com

Check prices at:

Please note that the price comparisons are based on search keywords - sometimes it might show cards with very similar names that are not exactly the same as the one chosen in the comparison. We do try to filter out the wrong results as best we can, though.

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