GeForce GTX 260 vs GeForce GTX 560 Ti

Intro

Compare all that to the GeForce GTX 560 Ti, which has a core clock speed of 822 MHz and a GDDR5 memory frequency of 1002 MHz. It also features a 256-bit memory bus, and uses a 40 nm design. It is comprised of 384 SPUs, 64 Texture Address Units, and 32 ROPs.

(No game benchmarks for this combination yet.)

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 560 Ti		170 Watts
GeForce GTX 260		182 Watts
	Difference: 12 Watts (7%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the GeForce GTX 560 Ti is 15% faster than the GeForce GTX 260 in general, due to its greater bandwidth. (explain)

GeForce GTX 560 Ti		128256 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 260		111888 MB/sec
	Difference: 16368 (15%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 560 Ti is a lot (about 43%) more effective at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce GTX 260. (explain)

GeForce GTX 560 Ti		52608 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 260		36864 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 15744 (43%)

Pixel Rate

If using lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 560 Ti is a better choice, by a large margin. (explain)

GeForce GTX 560 Ti		26304 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 260		16128 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 10176 (63%)

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 maximum amount of data (measured in megabytes per second) that can be transferred past the external memory interface in one second. It's worked out by multiplying the interface width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR type RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels the video card could possibly record to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel rate is also dependant on lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the max fill rate.