GeForce 9600 GSO ASUS 512 vs GeForce GT 440 3GB

Intro

Compare that to the GeForce GT 440 3GB, which makes use of a 40 nm design. nVidia has clocked the core speed at 594 MHz. The GDDR3 memory works at a speed of 900 MHz on this particular model. It features 144 SPUs along with 24 Texture Address Units and 24 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GT 440 3GB		56 Watts
GeForce 9600 GSO ASUS 512		84 Watts
	Difference: 28 Watts (50%)

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the GeForce GT 440 3GB should in theory be quite a bit superior to the GeForce 9600 GSO ASUS 512 overall. (explain)

GeForce GT 440 3GB		43200 MB/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO ASUS 512		16000 MB/sec
	Difference: 27200 (170%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9600 GSO ASUS 512 should be a lot (approximately 85%) more effective at AF than the GeForce GT 440 3GB. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GSO ASUS 512		26400 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GT 440 3GB		14256 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 12144 (85%)

Pixel Rate

If running with lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the GeForce GT 440 3GB is a better choice, and very much so. (explain)

GeForce GT 440 3GB		14256 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO ASUS 512		6600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 7656 (116%)

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 (in units of megabytes per second) that can be transported past the external memory interface within a second. It is calculated by multiplying the interface width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR type memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the card's 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 can be applied in one second. This figure is worked out by multiplying the total number of texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, 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 maximum number of pixels the graphics card can possibly record to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes 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 bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the maximum fill rate.