GeForce 8500 GT vs GeForce GTX 460

Intro

Compare those specifications 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 TAUs, and 24 ROPs.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8500 GT		45 Watts
GeForce GTX 460		150 Watts
	Difference: 105 Watts (233%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GTX 460 should theoretically perform quite a bit faster than the GeForce 8500 GT in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460		86400 MB/sec
GeForce 8500 GT		12800 MB/sec
	Difference: 73600 (575%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 460 should be quite a bit (more or less 950%) more effective at texture filtering than the GeForce 8500 GT. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460		37800 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8500 GT		3600 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 34200 (950%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 460 should be a lot (more or less 800%) more effective at FSAA than the GeForce 8500 GT, and also will be able to handle higher screen resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460		16200 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8500 GT		1800 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 14400 (800%)

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 largest amount of information (measured in megabytes per second) that can be transported over the external memory interface in one second. It's worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory clock speed. If the card has DDR RAM, it should 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 anti-aliasing, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels that the graphics chip can possibly record to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is worked out by multiplying the number of Render Output Units by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel fill rate also depends on quite a few other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the max fill rate.