GeForce 8600 GTS vs GeForce GTX 560 Ti

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GTX 560 Ti, which has a GPU core clock speed of 822 MHz, and 1024 MB of GDDR5 memory set to run at 1002 MHz through a 256-bit bus. It also features 384 Stream Processors, 64 Texture Address Units, and 32 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GTS		75 Watts
GeForce GTX 560 Ti		170 Watts
	Difference: 95 Watts (127%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce GTX 560 Ti will be 301% quicker than the GeForce 8600 GTS in general, because of its greater data rate. (explain)

GeForce GTX 560 Ti		128256 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GTS		32000 MB/sec
	Difference: 96256 (301%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 560 Ti should be a lot (about 387%) more effective at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce 8600 GTS. (explain)

GeForce GTX 560 Ti		52608 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GTS		10800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 41808 (387%)

Pixel Rate

If using a high resolution is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 560 Ti is the winner, by a large margin. (explain)

GeForce GTX 560 Ti		26304 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GTS		5400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 20904 (387%)

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 maximum amount of data (measured in megabytes per second) that can be moved across the external memory interface in one second. It's calculated by multiplying the interface width by its memory speed. If the card has DDR memory, it must be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the memory bandwidth, 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 amount of texture map elements (texels) that are processed in one second. This number is worked out by multiplying the total texture units of the card by the core clock speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, the better the card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels processed in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the graphics card can possibly record to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the amount of ROPs by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel output 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 reach the maximum fill rate.