GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB vs GeForce GT 320

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GT 320, which uses a 40 nm design. nVidia has set the core speed at 540 MHz. The GDDR3 RAM runs at a speed of 790 MHz on this card. It features 72 SPUs as well as 24 TAUs and 8 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GT 320		43 Watts
GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB		84 Watts
	Difference: 41 Watts (95%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically, the GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB should perform quite a bit faster than the GeForce GT 320 in general. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB		38400 MB/sec
GeForce GT 320		25280 MB/sec
	Difference: 13120 (52%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB will be quite a bit (about 104%) faster with regards to anisotropic filtering than the GeForce GT 320. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB		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 768MB is the winner, and very much so. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB		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 largest amount of data (measured in MB per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface within a second. It's calculated by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory speed. If the card has DDR type memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that can be applied in one second. This number is calculated by multiplying the total texture units of the card by the core clock speed of the chip. The higher the texel rate, the better the video card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels applied in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels the graphics card could possibly write to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the number 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 output rate also depends on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the maximum fill rate.