GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3 vs GeForce GTX 460 (OEM)

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GTX 460 (OEM), which comes with a GPU core clock speed of 650 MHz, and 1024 MB of GDDR5 memory set to run at 850 MHz through a 256-bit bus. It also features 336 Stream Processors, 56 Texture Address Units, and 32 ROPs.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3		50 Watts
GeForce GTX 460 (OEM)		150 Watts
	Difference: 100 Watts (200%)

Memory Bandwidth

Performance-wise, the GeForce GTX 460 (OEM) should theoretically be quite a bit better than the GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3 overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 (OEM)		108800 MB/sec
GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3		25600 MB/sec
	Difference: 83200 (325%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 460 (OEM) should be quite a bit (about 314%) better at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 (OEM)		36400 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3		8800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 27600 (314%)

Pixel Rate

If running with lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 460 (OEM) is the winner, by a large margin. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 (OEM)		20800 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3		4400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 16400 (373%)

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 maximum amount of information (measured in megabytes per second) that can be transported across the external memory interface within a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the bus width by the speed of its memory. If the card has DDR type memory, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum amount of texture map elements (texels) that are processed in one second. This is calculated by multiplying the total texture units by the core speed of the chip. The higher 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 maximum amount of pixels the graphics card could possibly write to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the number of Render Output Units by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel fill rate is also dependant on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.