GeForce 9600 GT 1GB vs GeForce GT 440 3GB

Intro

Compare all that to the GeForce GT 440 3GB, which has a GPU core clock speed of 594 MHz, and 3072 MB of GDDR3 RAM running at 900 MHz through a 192-bit bus. It also features 144 Stream Processors, 24 TAUs, and 24 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GT 440 3GB		56 Watts
GeForce 9600 GT 1GB		95 Watts
	Difference: 39 Watts (70%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce 9600 GT 1GB, in theory, should be a lot faster than the GeForce GT 440 3GB overall. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GT 1GB		57600 MB/sec
GeForce GT 440 3GB		43200 MB/sec
	Difference: 14400 (33%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9600 GT 1GB will be much (about 46%) more effective at texture filtering than the GeForce GT 440 3GB. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GT 1GB		20800 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GT 440 3GB		14256 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 6544 (46%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GT 440 3GB is quite a bit (approximately 37%) more effective at AA than the GeForce 9600 GT 1GB, and also should be capable of handling higher resolutions more effectively. (explain)

GeForce GT 440 3GB		14256 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9600 GT 1GB		10400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 3856 (37%)

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 largest amount of data (in units of MB per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface in a second. It's calculated by multiplying the bus width by its memory speed. If the card has DDR RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that can be applied per second. This figure is worked out by multiplying the total texture units by the core speed of the chip. The higher this number, the better the graphics card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels applied in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels that the graphics card could possibly write to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the number of ROPs by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel fill rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.