GeForce GTX 295 vs GeForce GTX 580

Intro

Compare that to the GeForce GTX 580, which has GPU clock speed of 772 MHz, and 1536 MB of GDDR5 RAM running at 1002 MHz through a 384-bit bus. It also is comprised of 512 Stream Processors, 64 TAUs, and 48 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 580		244 Watts
GeForce GTX 295		289 Watts
	Difference: 45 Watts (18%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GTX 295, in theory, should be a bit faster than the GeForce GTX 580 overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 295		223776 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 580		192384 MB/sec
	Difference: 31392 (16%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 295 will be quite a bit (approximately 87%) faster with regards to anisotropic filtering than the GeForce GTX 580. (explain)

GeForce GTX 295		92160 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 580		49408 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 42752 (87%)

Pixel Rate

If using high levels of AA is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 580 is a better choice, though not by far. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580		37056 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 295		32256 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 4800 (15%)

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.

One or more cards in this comparison are multi-core. This means that their bandwidth, texel and pixel rates are theoretically doubled - this does not mean the card will actually perform twice as fast, but only that it should in theory be able to. Actual game benchmarks will give a more accurate idea of what it's capable of.

Price Comparison

Specifications

Memory Bandwidth: Memory bandwidth is the maximum amount of data (measured in megabytes per second) that can be moved across the external memory interface in one second. The number is calculated by multiplying the bus width by its memory speed. If it uses DDR type RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels that the graphics card could possibly record to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the number of Render Output Units by the clock 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 fill rate is also dependant 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.