GeForce GT 310 vs GeForce GT 430 1GB

Intro

Compare all that to the GeForce GT 430 1GB, which comes with a clock frequency of 700 MHz and a GDDR3 memory speed of 900 MHz. It also features a 128-bit bus, and uses a 40 nm design. It features 96 SPUs, 16 Texture Address Units, and 4 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GT 310		31 Watts
GeForce GT 430 1GB		60 Watts
	Difference: 29 Watts (94%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce GT 430 1GB will be 80% faster than the GeForce GT 310 overall, because of its higher data rate. (explain)

GeForce GT 430 1GB		28800 MB/sec
GeForce GT 310		16000 MB/sec
	Difference: 12800 (80%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GT 430 1GB will be much (more or less 138%) more effective at AF than the GeForce GT 310. (explain)

GeForce GT 430 1GB		11200 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GT 310		4712 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 6488 (138%)

Pixel Rate

If running with high levels of AA is important to you, then the GeForce GT 430 1GB is a better choice, but only just. (explain)

GeForce GT 430 1GB		2800 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GT 310		2356 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 444 (19%)

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 max amount of data (measured in MB per second) that can be moved over the external memory interface in one second. It is worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory clock speed. If the card has DDR memory, it 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 AA, HDR and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the graphics card can possibly record to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is worked out by multiplying the number of Render Output Units by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel output 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 max fill rate.