GeForce 9600 GT 512MB vs GeForce GTX 460 1GB

Intro

Compare all that to the GeForce GTX 460 1GB, which has a clock speed of 675 MHz and a GDDR5 memory frequency of 900 MHz. It also makes use of a 256-bit memory bus, and makes use of a 40 nm design. It is made up of 336 SPUs, 56 TAUs, and 32 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9600 GT 512MB		95 Watts
GeForce GTX 460 1GB		160 Watts
	Difference: 65 Watts (68%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GTX 460 1GB, in theory, should perform quite a bit faster than the GeForce 9600 GT 512MB in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 1GB		115200 MB/sec
GeForce 9600 GT 512MB		57600 MB/sec
	Difference: 57600 (100%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 460 1GB is a lot (approximately 82%) more effective at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce 9600 GT 512MB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 1GB		37800 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9600 GT 512MB		20800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 17000 (82%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 460 1GB will be quite a bit (about 108%) better at full screen anti-aliasing than the GeForce 9600 GT 512MB, and will be capable of handling higher screen resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 1GB		21600 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9600 GT 512MB		10400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 11200 (108%)

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 (measured in megabytes per second) that can be transferred across the external memory interface in a second. The number is worked out by multiplying the interface width by its memory speed. If it uses DDR type memory, it must be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that are processed per second. This figure is calculated by multiplying the total texture units by the core clock speed of the chip. The better this number, 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 maximum amount of pixels that the graphics chip could possibly record to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the number of ROPs by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel rate also depends on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the max fill rate.