GeForce GTX 460 (OEM) vs GeForce GTX 550 Ti

Intro

Compare that to the GeForce GTX 550 Ti, which features clock speeds of 900 MHz on the GPU, and 1026 MHz on the 1024 MB of GDDR5 memory. It features 192 SPUs as well as 32 TAUs and 24 Rasterization Operator Units.

(No game benchmarks for this combination yet.)

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 550 Ti		116 Watts
GeForce GTX 460 (OEM)		150 Watts
	Difference: 34 Watts (29%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the GeForce GTX 460 (OEM) will be 10% quicker than the GeForce GTX 550 Ti in general, because of its higher data rate. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 (OEM)		108800 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 550 Ti		98496 MB/sec
	Difference: 10304 (10%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 460 (OEM) is a lot (about 26%) faster with regards to anisotropic filtering than the GeForce GTX 550 Ti. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 (OEM)		36400 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 550 Ti		28800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 7600 (26%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 550 Ti should be a bit (approximately 4%) faster with regards to FSAA than the GeForce GTX 460 (OEM), and able to handle higher resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

GeForce GTX 550 Ti		21600 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 460 (OEM)		20800 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 800 (4%)

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 data (measured in MB per second) that can be moved over the external memory interface in a second. It is worked out by multiplying the bus width by its memory speed. In the case of DDR type RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the video card could possibly write to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the the core clock speed. 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 fill rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the maximum fill rate.