GeForce 8800 GT 512MB vs GeForce GTX 460 SE

Intro

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

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8800 GT 512MB		105 Watts
GeForce GTX 460 SE		150 Watts
	Difference: 45 Watts (43%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the GeForce GTX 460 SE is 89% quicker than the GeForce 8800 GT 512MB overall, because of its greater bandwidth. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 SE		108800 MB/sec
GeForce 8800 GT 512MB		57600 MB/sec
	Difference: 51200 (89%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 8800 GT 512MB will be a bit (more or less 8%) better at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce GTX 460 SE. (explain)

GeForce 8800 GT 512MB		33600 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 460 SE		31200 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 2400 (8%)

Pixel Rate

If running with a high resolution is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 460 SE is superior to the GeForce 8800 GT 512MB, by a large margin. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 SE		20800 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8800 GT 512MB		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 information (in units of MB per second) that can be transported past the external memory interface in one second. It is worked out by multiplying the bus width by its memory clock speed. If the card has DDR memory, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels that the graphics chip could possibly record to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the number of colour ROPs by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel fill rate also depends on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the max fill rate.