GeForce 9400 GT 256MB vs GeForce GT 320

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GT 320, which has core clock speeds of 540 MHz on the GPU, and 790 MHz on the 1024 MB of GDDR3 memory. It features 72 SPUs along with 24 Texture Address Units and 8 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GT 320		43 Watts
GeForce 9400 GT 256MB		50 Watts
	Difference: 7 Watts (16%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GT 320 should in theory perform a lot faster than the GeForce 9400 GT 256MB overall. (explain)

GeForce GT 320		25280 MB/sec
GeForce 9400 GT 256MB		12800 MB/sec
	Difference: 12480 (98%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GT 320 should be much (approximately 195%) better at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce 9400 GT 256MB. (explain)

GeForce GT 320		12960 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9400 GT 256MB		4400 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 8560 (195%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GT 320 should be quite a bit (more or less 96%) more effective at full screen anti-aliasing than the GeForce 9400 GT 256MB, and also will be able to handle higher screen resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

GeForce GT 320		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: Bandwidth is the maximum amount of information (measured in MB per second) that can be transferred past the external memory interface in a second. It is worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by the speed of its memory. If the card has DDR RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 once 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 applied in one second. This number is calculated by multiplying the total texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The higher this number, the better the video 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 most pixels that the graphics card could possibly write to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the number of colour ROPs by the the card's clock speed. 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 also depends on lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the maximum fill rate.