GeForce GT 340 vs GeForce GTX 580 3GB

Intro

Compare all that to the GeForce GTX 580 3GB, which makes use of a 40 nm design. nVidia has clocked the core speed at 772 MHz. The GDDR5 memory works at a speed of 1002 MHz on this specific card. It features 512 SPUs along with 64 TAUs and 48 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GT 340		69 Watts
GeForce GTX 580 3GB		244 Watts
	Difference: 175 Watts (254%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the GeForce GTX 580 3GB should be 254% faster than the GeForce GT 340 in general, because of its higher bandwidth. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		192384 MB/sec
GeForce GT 340		54400 MB/sec
	Difference: 137984 (254%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 580 3GB should be quite a bit (approximately 181%) more effective at AF than the GeForce GT 340. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		49408 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GT 340		17600 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 31808 (181%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 580 3GB is quite a bit (about 742%) better at FSAA than the GeForce GT 340, and should be able to handle higher screen resolutions better. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		37056 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GT 340		4400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 32656 (742%)

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 max amount of information (counted in MB per second) that can be transported past the external memory interface in a second. It's calculated by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory clock speed. In the case of DDR RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the bandwidth is, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and higher screen 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 of the card by the core speed of the chip. The higher this number, the better the card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the video card can possibly write to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the number of Raster Operations Pipelines 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 output rate also depends on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the max fill rate.