GeForce GTX 260 Core 216 vs GeForce GTX 580 3GB

Intro

Compare all that to the GeForce GTX 580 3GB, which has a GPU core clock speed of 772 MHz, and 3072 MB of GDDR5 RAM running at 1002 MHz through a 384-bit bus. It also is made up of 512 Stream Processors, 64 Texture Address Units, and 48 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 260 Core 216		202 Watts
GeForce GTX 580 3GB		244 Watts
	Difference: 42 Watts (21%)

Memory Bandwidth

Performance-wise, the GeForce GTX 580 3GB should in theory be quite a bit superior to the GeForce GTX 260 Core 216 overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		192384 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 260 Core 216		111888 MB/sec
	Difference: 80496 (72%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 580 3GB should be a bit (about 19%) faster with regards to anisotropic filtering than the GeForce GTX 260 Core 216. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		49408 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 260 Core 216		41472 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 7936 (19%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 580 3GB will be much (approximately 130%) faster with regards to AA than the GeForce GTX 260 Core 216, and capable of handling higher screen resolutions more effectively. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		37056 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 260 Core 216		16128 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 20928 (130%)

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 largest amount of information (counted in megabytes per second) that can be transferred past the external memory interface within a second. It is calculated by multiplying the bus width by the speed of its memory. If the card has DDR memory, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the bandwidth is, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum amount of texture map elements (texels) that can be applied in one second. This number is calculated by multiplying the total amount of texture units by the core speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, the better the video 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 number of pixels that the graphics chip can possibly record to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the amount of Render Output Units by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel output rate is also dependant on lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the maximum fill rate.