GeForce GTS 150 vs GeForce GTX 460 1GB

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GTX 460 1GB, which comes with clock speeds of 675 MHz on the GPU, and 900 MHz on the 1024 MB of GDDR5 RAM. It features 336 SPUs along with 56 Texture Address Units and 32 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTS 150		141 Watts
GeForce GTX 460 1GB		160 Watts
	Difference: 19 Watts (13%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GTX 460 1GB should in theory perform much faster than the GeForce GTS 150 in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 1GB		115200 MB/sec
GeForce GTS 150		32000 MB/sec
	Difference: 83200 (260%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTS 150 should be much (approximately 25%) more effective at AF than the GeForce GTX 460 1GB. (explain)

GeForce GTS 150		47360 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 460 1GB		37800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 9560 (25%)

Pixel Rate

If running with a high resolution is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 460 1GB is a better choice, by far. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 1GB		21600 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTS 150		11840 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 9760 (82%)

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 largest amount of data (in units of MB per second) that can be transported across the external memory interface in one second. It is worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory clock speed. In the case of DDR type memory, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the 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 number of texture map elements (texels) that are processed in one second. This number is calculated by multiplying the total amount of texture units of the card by the core 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 applied in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the video card can possibly write to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the the card's 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 is also dependant on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.