GeForce 9800 GT 1GB vs GeForce GTX 580 3GB

Intro

Compare those specs to the GeForce GTX 580 3GB, which features a GPU core clock speed of 772 MHz, and 3072 MB of GDDR5 memory set to run at 1002 MHz through a 384-bit bus. It also is comprised of 512 SPUs, 64 TAUs, and 48 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9800 GT 1GB		105 Watts
GeForce GTX 580 3GB		244 Watts
	Difference: 139 Watts (132%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GTX 580 3GB should in theory perform quite a bit faster than the GeForce 9800 GT 1GB overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		192384 MB/sec
GeForce 9800 GT 1GB		57600 MB/sec
	Difference: 134784 (234%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 580 3GB will be much (approximately 47%) better at AF than the GeForce 9800 GT 1GB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		49408 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9800 GT 1GB		33600 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 15808 (47%)

Pixel Rate

If running with lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 580 3GB is a better choice, by a large margin. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580 3GB		37056 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9800 GT 1GB		9600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 27456 (286%)

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 max amount of information (counted in megabytes per second) that can be transported over the external memory interface within a second. It is worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory clock speed. In the case of DDR memory, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the bandwidth is, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum amount of texture map elements (texels) that are applied per second. This figure is worked out by multiplying the total texture units by the core clock 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 a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the video card could possibly write to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the amount of Render Output Units by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel rate is also dependant on lots of other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the max fill rate.