GeForce GT 340 1GB vs GeForce GTX 580 3GB

Intro

Compare that to the GeForce GTX 580 3GB, which has a clock frequency of 772 MHz and a GDDR5 memory frequency of 1002 MHz. It also makes use of a 384-bit memory bus, and uses a 40 nm design. It features 512 SPUs, 64 Texture Address Units, and 48 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GT 340 1GB		69 Watts
GeForce GTX 580 3GB		244 Watts
	Difference: 175 Watts (254%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GTX 580 3GB, in theory, should perform much faster than the GeForce GT 340 1GB in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		192384 MB/sec
GeForce GT 340 1GB		54400 MB/sec
	Difference: 137984 (254%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 580 3GB should be a lot (approximately 181%) more effective at texture filtering than the GeForce GT 340 1GB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		49408 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GT 340 1GB		17600 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 31808 (181%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 580 3GB will be a lot (about 742%) more effective at anti-aliasing than the GeForce GT 340 1GB, and also able to handle higher resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		37056 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GT 340 1GB		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 data (counted in MB per second) that can be transported past the external memory interface in a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the bus width by the speed of its memory. If it uses DDR RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels that the graphics chip can possibly write to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the amount of ROPs by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel fill rate also depends on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the max fill rate.