GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB vs GeForce GT 320

Intro

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

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GT 320		43 Watts
GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB		84 Watts
	Difference: 41 Watts (95%)

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB should in theory be quite a bit superior to the GeForce GT 320 overall. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB		38400 MB/sec
GeForce GT 320		25280 MB/sec
	Difference: 13120 (52%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB should be a lot (more or less 104%) better at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce GT 320. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB		26400 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GT 320		12960 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 13440 (104%)

Pixel Rate

If using a high resolution is important to you, then the GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB is superior to the GeForce GT 320, and very much so. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB		6600 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GT 320		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 2280 (53%)

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: Memory bandwidth is the maximum amount of data (measured in megabytes per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface in one second. It's calculated by multiplying the bus width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR memory, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better 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 per second. This is worked out by multiplying the total amount of texture units by the core clock speed of the chip. The higher this number, the better the graphics card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels that the graphics chip can possibly write to the local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated 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 filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel fill rate is also dependant on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.