GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2 vs GeForce GT 340

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GT 340, which has core clock speeds of 550 MHz on the GPU, and 850 MHz on the 512 MB of GDDR5 RAM. It features 96 SPUs along with 32 Texture Address Units and 8 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2		47 Watts
GeForce GT 340		69 Watts
	Difference: 22 Watts (47%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the GeForce GT 340 should perform a lot faster than the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2 overall. (explain)

GeForce GT 340		54400 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2		12800 MB/sec
	Difference: 41600 (325%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GT 340 should be much (more or less 104%) more effective at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2. (explain)

GeForce GT 340		17600 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 8960 (104%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GT 340 should be just a bit (approximately 2%) more effective at full screen anti-aliasing than the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2, and capable of handling higher screen resolutions more effectively. (explain)

GeForce GT 340		4400 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 80 (2%)

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 megabytes per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface in a second. It is worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory speed. In the case of DDR RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the bandwidth is, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that are processed in one second. This number is worked out by multiplying the total amount of texture units of the card by the core 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 a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels that the graphics card could possibly record to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is worked out by multiplying the amount of ROPs by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel output rate is also dependant on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the maximum fill rate.