GeForce GTS 250 512MB vs GeForce GTX 460

Intro

Compare that to the GeForce GTX 460, which comes with GPU clock speed of 675 MHz, and 768 MB of GDDR5 memory set to run at 900 MHz through a 192-bit bus. It also features 336 SPUs, 56 Texture Address Units, and 24 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTS 250 512MB		145 Watts
GeForce GTX 460		150 Watts
	Difference: 5 Watts (3%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce GTX 460 will be 23% faster than the GeForce GTS 250 512MB overall, because of its higher bandwidth. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460		86400 MB/sec
GeForce GTS 250 512MB		70400 MB/sec
	Difference: 16000 (23%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTS 250 512MB is quite a bit (more or less 25%) more effective at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce GTX 460. (explain)

GeForce GTS 250 512MB		47232 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 460		37800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 9432 (25%)

Pixel Rate

If using a high screen resolution is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 460 is a better choice, and very much so. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460		16200 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTS 250 512MB		11808 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 4392 (37%)

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 information (counted in megabytes per second) that can be moved across the external memory interface in one second. It is worked out by multiplying the interface width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the bandwidth is, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that can be applied per second. This is worked out by multiplying the total texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The higher the texel rate, the better the graphics 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 chip could possibly record to its local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the number of ROPs by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel output rate also depends on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the maximum fill rate.