GeForce GTS 450 vs GeForce GTX 260

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GTX 260, which has GPU clock speed of 576 MHz, and 896 MB of GDDR3 memory set to run at 999 MHz through a 448-bit bus. It also is made up of 192 Stream Processors, 64 TAUs, and 28 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTS 450		106 Watts
GeForce GTX 260		182 Watts
	Difference: 76 Watts (72%)

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the GeForce GTX 260 should theoretically be a lot better than the GeForce GTS 450 overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 260		111888 MB/sec
GeForce GTS 450		57728 MB/sec
	Difference: 54160 (94%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 260 is quite a bit (about 47%) more effective at texture filtering than the GeForce GTS 450. (explain)

GeForce GTX 260		36864 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTS 450		25056 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 11808 (47%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 260 should be a lot (about 29%) more effective at full screen anti-aliasing than the GeForce GTS 450, and also capable of handling higher screen resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

GeForce GTX 260		16128 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTS 450		12528 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 3600 (29%)

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 max amount of information (measured in MB per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface within a second. It's calculated by multiplying the interface width by its memory speed. In the case of DDR type RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the bandwidth is, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that are applied in one second. This figure is worked out by multiplying the total number of texture units of the card by the core clock speed of the chip. The higher the texel rate, the better the graphics 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 that the graphics chip can possibly write to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the number of colour ROPs by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel rate also depends on lots of other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the maximum fill rate.