GeForce 9800 GTX vs GeForce GTX 460 1GB

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GTX 460 1GB, which comes with core speeds of 675 MHz on the GPU, and 900 MHz on the 1024 MB of GDDR5 memory. It features 336 SPUs as well as 56 TAUs and 32 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9800 GTX		140 Watts
GeForce GTX 460 1GB		160 Watts
	Difference: 20 Watts (14%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GTX 460 1GB should in theory be much faster than the GeForce 9800 GTX in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 1GB		115200 MB/sec
GeForce 9800 GTX		70400 MB/sec
	Difference: 44800 (64%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9800 GTX should be just a bit (more or less 14%) faster with regards to anisotropic filtering than the GeForce GTX 460 1GB. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GTX		43200 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 460 1GB		37800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 5400 (14%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 460 1GB is much (approximately 100%) faster with regards to anti-aliasing than the GeForce 9800 GTX, and also capable of handling higher resolutions better. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 1GB		21600 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9800 GTX		10800 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 10800 (100%)

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 information (in units of MB per second) that can be moved over the external memory interface within a second. It is calculated by multiplying the bus width by the speed of its memory. If the card has DDR RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the bandwidth is, the faster 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 texture map elements (texels) that are applied in one second. This number is calculated by multiplying the total amount of texture units by the core clock 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 in one second.

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