GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3 vs GeForce 9800 GX2

Intro

Compare all of that to the GeForce 9800 GX2, which features GPU core speed of 600 MHz, and 512 MB of GDDR3 RAM running at 1000 MHz through a 256-bit bus. It also is made up of 128 SPUs, 64 Texture Address Units, and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3		47 Watts
GeForce 9800 GX2		197 Watts
	Difference: 150 Watts (319%)

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the GeForce 9800 GX2 should theoretically be much superior to the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3 overall. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GX2		128000 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3		22400 MB/sec
	Difference: 105600 (471%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9800 GX2 should be much (about 789%) better at texture filtering than the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GX2		76800 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 68160 (789%)

Pixel Rate

If using a high screen resolution is important to you, then the GeForce 9800 GX2 is a better choice, by far. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GX2		19200 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 14880 (344%)

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

Specifications

Memory Bandwidth: Bandwidth is the largest amount of data (counted in megabytes per second) that can be transported across the external memory interface in one second. The number is worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory clock speed. In the case of DDR type memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that are processed per second. This figure is calculated by multiplying the total amount of texture units by the core speed of the chip. The better 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 one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels that the graphics chip could possibly write to the local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated 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 outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel fill rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the max fill rate.