GeForce 8600 GT 1GB DDR2 vs GeForce GTX 480

Intro

Compare all that to the GeForce GTX 480, which comes with clock speeds of 700 MHz on the GPU, and 924 MHz on the 1536 MB of GDDR5 memory. It features 480 SPUs along with 60 TAUs and 48 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GT 1GB DDR2		47 Watts
GeForce GTX 480		250 Watts
	Difference: 203 Watts (432%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GTX 480 should in theory perform much faster than the GeForce 8600 GT 1GB DDR2 in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 480		177408 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 1GB DDR2		12800 MB/sec
	Difference: 164608 (1286%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 480 is quite a bit (about 386%) more effective at texture filtering than the GeForce 8600 GT 1GB DDR2. (explain)

GeForce GTX 480		42000 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 1GB DDR2		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 33360 (386%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 480 is quite a bit (approximately 678%) more effective at anti-aliasing than the GeForce 8600 GT 1GB DDR2, and will be able to handle higher screen resolutions without slowing down too much. (explain)

GeForce GTX 480		33600 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 1GB DDR2		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 29280 (678%)

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 max amount of information (counted in megabytes per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface in a second. It is worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR type RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the bandwidth is, 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 amount of texture map elements (texels) that can be processed in one second. This number is worked out by multiplying the total amount of texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The higher this number, the better the 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 number of pixels the video card can possibly write to the local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the number of ROPs by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called 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, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the max fill rate.