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GeForce 8800 GTX vs GeForce 9800 GX2

Intro

The GeForce 8800 GTX makes use of a 90 nm design. nVidia has clocked the core frequency at 575 MHz. The GDDR3 memory is set to run at a speed of 900 MHz on this specific card. It features 128 SPUs along with 64 Texture Address Units and 24 Rasterization Operator Units.

Compare those specs to the GeForce 9800 GX2, which features core clock speeds of 600 MHz on the GPU, and 1000 MHz on the 512 MB of GDDR3 memory. It features 128 SPUs along with 64 TAUs and 16 Rasterization Operator Units.

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8800 GTX 155 Watts
GeForce 9800 GX2 197 Watts
Difference: 42 Watts (27%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce 9800 GX2 should be a lot faster than the GeForce 8800 GTX in general. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GX2 128000 MB/sec
GeForce 8800 GTX 86400 MB/sec
Difference: 41600 (48%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9800 GX2 will be a lot (more or less 109%) more effective at texture filtering than the GeForce 8800 GTX. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GX2 76800 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8800 GTX 36800 Mtexels/sec
Difference: 40000 (109%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce 9800 GX2 will be much (approximately 39%) faster with regards to anti-aliasing than the GeForce 8800 GTX, and should be able to handle higher resolutions without slowing down too much. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GX2 19200 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8800 GTX 13800 Mpixels/sec
Difference: 5400 (39%)

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.

One or more cards in this comparison are multi-core. This means that their bandwidth, texel and pixel rates are theoretically doubled - this does not mean the card will actually perform twice as fast, but only that it should in theory be able to. Actual game benchmarks will give a more accurate idea of what it's capable of.

Price Comparison

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GeForce 8800 GTX

Amazon.com

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GeForce 9800 GX2

Amazon.com

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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

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Model GeForce 8800 GTX GeForce 9800 GX2
Manufacturer nVidia nVidia
Year Nov 2006 Mar 2008
Code Name G80 G92
Memory 768 MB 512 MB (x2)
Core Speed 575 MHz 600 MHz (x2)
Memory Speed 1800 MHz 2000 MHz (x2)
Power (Max TDP) 155 watts 197 watts
Bandwidth 86400 MB/sec 128000 MB/sec
Texel Rate 36800 Mtexels/sec 76800 Mtexels/sec
Pixel Rate 13800 Mpixels/sec 19200 Mpixels/sec
Unified Shaders 128 128 (x2)
Texture Mapping Units 64 64 (x2)
Render Output Units 24 16 (x2)
Bus Type GDDR3 GDDR3
Bus Width 384-bit 256-bit (x2)
Fab Process 90 nm 65 nm
Transistors 681 million 754 million
Bus PCIe x16 PCIe x16 2.0
DirectX Version DirectX 10 DirectX 10
OpenGL Version OpenGL 3.0 OpenGL 3.0

Memory Bandwidth: Memory bandwidth is the max amount of data (measured in megabytes per second) that can be transferred past the external memory interface within a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR type RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 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 texture map elements (texels) that can be processed in one second. This is worked out by multiplying the total texture units by the core clock speed of the chip. The higher this number, the better the video 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 the video card can possibly write to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the amount of ROPs by the the core 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 output rate is also dependant on lots of other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the max fill rate.

Display Prices

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GeForce 8800 GTX

Amazon.com

Check prices at:

GeForce 9800 GX2

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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