GeForce 8600 GT 512MB GDDR3 vs GeForce GTS 450

Intro

Compare those specs to the GeForce GTS 450, which comes with 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 8600 GT 512MB GDDR3		47 Watts
GeForce GTS 450		106 Watts
	Difference: 59 Watts (126%)

Memory Bandwidth

Performance-wise, the GeForce GTS 450 should in theory be a lot better than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB GDDR3 overall. (explain)

GeForce GTS 450		57728 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB GDDR3		22400 MB/sec
	Difference: 35328 (158%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTS 450 is much (more or less 190%) more effective at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB GDDR3. (explain)

GeForce GTS 450		25056 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB GDDR3		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 16416 (190%)

Pixel Rate

If running with lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the GeForce GTS 450 is superior to the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB GDDR3, and very much so. (explain)

GeForce GTS 450		12528 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB GDDR3		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 8208 (190%)

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 maximum amount of data (in units of MB per second) that can be moved across the external memory interface in a second. It is calculated by multiplying the bus width by the speed of its memory. If the card has DDR type memory, the result 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, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that are processed in one second. This is worked out by multiplying the total number of texture units by the core speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, the better the video card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the video card could possibly record to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the amount of Raster Operations Pipelines by the the core clock speed. 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 many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the max fill rate.