GeForce 9800 GTX+ vs GeForce GTX 580 3GB

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GTX 580 3GB, which comes with clock speeds of 772 MHz on the GPU, and 1002 MHz on the 3072 MB of GDDR5 memory. It features 512 SPUs as well as 64 TAUs and 48 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9800 GTX+		145 Watts
GeForce GTX 580 3GB		244 Watts
	Difference: 99 Watts (68%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically, the GeForce GTX 580 3GB should be quite a bit faster than the GeForce 9800 GTX+ overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		192384 MB/sec
GeForce 9800 GTX+		70400 MB/sec
	Difference: 121984 (173%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 580 3GB is a little bit (about 5%) more effective at AF than the GeForce 9800 GTX+. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		49408 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9800 GTX+		47232 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 2176 (5%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 580 3GB should be quite a bit (about 214%) more effective at AA than the GeForce 9800 GTX+, and also capable of handling higher screen resolutions better. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		37056 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9800 GTX+		11808 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 25248 (214%)

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 (counted in megabytes per second) that can be moved over the external memory interface in a second. It is calculated by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory speed. If the card has DDR memory, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the graphics card can possibly write to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the number of colour ROPs by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel rate also depends on quite a few 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.