GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB vs GeForce GTS 450

Intro

Compare those specs to the GeForce GTS 450, which features core speeds of 783 MHz on the GPU, and 902 MHz on the 512 MB of GDDR5 memory. It features 192 SPUs as well as 32 TAUs and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB		84 Watts
GeForce GTS 450		106 Watts
	Difference: 22 Watts (26%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically, the GeForce GTS 450 should perform quite a bit faster than the GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB overall. (explain)

GeForce GTS 450		57728 MB/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB		38400 MB/sec
	Difference: 19328 (50%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB will be a little bit (more or less 5%) more effective at AF than the GeForce GTS 450. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB		26400 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTS 450		25056 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 1344 (5%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTS 450 should be a lot (more or less 90%) faster with regards to full screen anti-aliasing than the GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB, and will be capable of handling higher screen resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

GeForce GTS 450		12528 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB		6600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 5928 (90%)

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 information (measured in megabytes per second) that can be transferred past the external memory interface in one second. It is worked out by multiplying the interface width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the memory bandwidth, 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 number of texture map elements (texels) that can be applied in one second. This number is calculated by multiplying the total texture units by the core clock speed of the chip. The higher this number, the better the card will be at 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 the graphics card can possibly write to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the amount 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 output rate is also dependant on lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the max fill rate.