GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3 vs GeForce GTX 480

Intro

Compare all that to the GeForce GTX 480, which makes use of a 40 nm design. nVidia has set the core frequency at 700 MHz. The GDDR5 RAM is set to run at a frequency of 924 MHz on this model. It features 480 SPUs as well as 60 TAUs and 48 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3		47 Watts
GeForce GTX 480		250 Watts
	Difference: 203 Watts (432%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GTX 480, in theory, should perform quite a bit faster than the GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3 overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 480		177408 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3		22400 MB/sec
	Difference: 155008 (692%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 480 should be quite a bit (about 386%) more effective at AF than the GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3. (explain)

GeForce GTX 480		42000 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 33360 (386%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 480 will be a lot (more or less 678%) better at FSAA than the GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3, and should be able to handle higher resolutions better. (explain)

GeForce GTX 480		33600 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3		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 (in units of megabytes per second) that can be moved over the external memory interface in a second. It is calculated by multiplying the card's interface 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 better the bandwidth is, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that can be processed per second. This figure is worked out by multiplying the total texture units by the core clock speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, the better the card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels applied per second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the graphics card could possibly record to the local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the number of ROPs by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the max fill rate.