GeForce 8800 GT 256MB vs GeForce GTX 460 SE

Intro

Compare those specs to the GeForce GTX 460 SE, which uses a 40 nm design. nVidia has set the core frequency at 650 MHz. The GDDR5 RAM works at a speed of 850 MHz on this card. It features 288 SPUs as well as 48 TAUs and 32 ROPs.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8800 GT 256MB		105 Watts
GeForce GTX 460 SE		150 Watts
	Difference: 45 Watts (43%)

Memory Bandwidth

Performance-wise, the GeForce GTX 460 SE should in theory be much better than the GeForce 8800 GT 256MB overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 SE		108800 MB/sec
GeForce 8800 GT 256MB		44800 MB/sec
	Difference: 64000 (143%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 8800 GT 256MB is just a bit (more or less 8%) faster with regards to anisotropic filtering than the GeForce GTX 460 SE. (explain)

GeForce 8800 GT 256MB		33600 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 460 SE		31200 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 2400 (8%)

Pixel Rate

If using a high resolution is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 460 SE is the winner, by a large margin. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 SE		20800 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8800 GT 256MB		9600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 11200 (117%)

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 data (in units of megabytes per second) that can be moved across the external memory interface in one second. The number is calculated by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory clock speed. If the card has DDR memory, it must be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the bandwidth is, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels that the graphics card can possibly write to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the number of Render Output Units by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel fill 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.