GeForce GTX 285 2GB vs GeForce GTX 580 3GB

Intro

Compare all of 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 RAM is set to run at a speed of 1002 MHz on this specific model. 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 GTX 285 2GB		204 Watts
GeForce GTX 580 3GB		244 Watts
	Difference: 40 Watts (20%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce GTX 580 3GB should be 21% faster than the GeForce GTX 285 2GB overall, because of its higher data rate. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		192384 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 285 2GB		158976 MB/sec
	Difference: 33408 (21%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 285 2GB should be a small bit (more or less 5%) better at texture filtering than the GeForce GTX 580 3GB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 285 2GB		51840 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 580 3GB		49408 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 2432 (5%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 580 3GB is quite a bit (about 79%) more effective at AA than the GeForce GTX 285 2GB, and will be capable of handling higher screen resolutions better. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		37056 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 285 2GB		20736 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 16320 (79%)

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 largest amount of data (measured in MB per second) that can be moved over the external memory interface in one second. It is worked out by multiplying the bus width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the bandwidth is, the faster 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 can be applied in one second. This is calculated by multiplying the total texture units by the core speed of the chip. The better this number, the better the graphics 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 the video card could possibly record to the local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the amount of Raster Operations Pipelines by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel fill rate also depends on lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.