GeForce GTX 285 1GB vs GeForce GTX 550 Ti

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GTX 550 Ti, which comes with core speeds of 900 MHz on the GPU, and 1026 MHz on the 1024 MB of GDDR5 memory. It features 192 SPUs along with 32 Texture Address Units and 24 ROPs.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 550 Ti		116 Watts
GeForce GTX 285 1GB		204 Watts
	Difference: 88 Watts (76%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GTX 285 1GB should theoretically be much faster than the GeForce GTX 550 Ti overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 285 1GB		158976 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 550 Ti		98496 MB/sec
	Difference: 60480 (61%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 285 1GB will be a lot (about 80%) more effective at AF than the GeForce GTX 550 Ti. (explain)

GeForce GTX 285 1GB		51840 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 550 Ti		28800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 23040 (80%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 550 Ti is just a bit (more or less 4%) more effective at anti-aliasing than the GeForce GTX 285 1GB, and also should be able to handle higher screen resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

GeForce GTX 550 Ti		21600 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 285 1GB		20736 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 864 (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: Bandwidth is the maximum amount of information (counted in megabytes per second) that can be transported over the external memory interface in one second. It is calculated by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory speed. In the case of DDR memory, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If 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 higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels that the graphics card could possibly record to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the number of Render Output Units by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel output rate is also dependant on lots of other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the max fill rate.