GeForce GTX 280 vs GeForce GTX 460 SE

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GTX 460 SE, which comes with a GPU core clock speed of 650 MHz, and 1024 MB of GDDR5 RAM set to run at 850 MHz through a 256-bit bus. It also features 288 SPUs, 48 Texture Address Units, and 32 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 460 SE		150 Watts
GeForce GTX 280		236 Watts
	Difference: 86 Watts (57%)

Memory Bandwidth

Performance-wise, the GeForce GTX 280 should in theory be a lot superior to the GeForce GTX 460 SE in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 280		141696 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 460 SE		108800 MB/sec
	Difference: 32896 (30%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 280 should be much (approximately 54%) more effective at texture filtering than the GeForce GTX 460 SE. (explain)

GeForce GTX 280		48160 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 460 SE		31200 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 16960 (54%)

Pixel Rate

If running with a high resolution is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 460 SE is superior to the GeForce GTX 280, though only just barely. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 SE		20800 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 280		19264 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 1536 (8%)

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 information (counted in MB per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface in a second. It's calculated by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR type RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the graphics card can possibly write to its local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel rate also depends on many 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.