GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB vs GeForce GTX 470

Intro

Compare all that to the GeForce GTX 470, which uses a 40 nm design. nVidia has set the core frequency at 607 MHz. The GDDR5 RAM is set to run at a speed of 837 MHz on this specific model. It features 448 SPUs along with 56 TAUs and 40 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB		84 Watts
GeForce GTX 470		215 Watts
	Difference: 131 Watts (156%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GTX 470, in theory, should be much faster than the GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 470		133920 MB/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB		38400 MB/sec
	Difference: 95520 (249%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 470 will be quite a bit (more or less 29%) faster with regards to AF than the GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 470		33992 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB		26400 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 7592 (29%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 470 should be quite a bit (about 268%) faster with regards to full screen anti-aliasing than the GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB, and also will be able to handle higher screen resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

GeForce GTX 470		24280 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB		6600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 17680 (268%)

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 moved past the external memory interface in one second. It is calculated by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR memory, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

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