GeForce GTS 250 512MB vs GeForce GTX 550 Ti

Intro

Compare that 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 GTS 250 512MB		145 Watts
	Difference: 29 Watts (25%)

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the GeForce GTX 550 Ti should in theory be a lot better than the GeForce GTS 250 512MB in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 550 Ti		98496 MB/sec
GeForce GTS 250 512MB		70400 MB/sec
	Difference: 28096 (40%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTS 250 512MB should be a lot (approximately 64%) faster with regards to texture filtering than the GeForce GTX 550 Ti. (explain)

GeForce GTS 250 512MB		47232 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 550 Ti		28800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 18432 (64%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 550 Ti is a lot (about 83%) more effective at FSAA than the GeForce GTS 250 512MB, and also should be capable of handling higher screen resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

GeForce GTX 550 Ti		21600 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTS 250 512MB		11808 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 9792 (83%)

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 information (measured in MB per second) that can be transported over the external memory interface in one second. It's calculated by multiplying the bus width by its memory speed. In the case of DDR type memory, it must be multiplied by 2 once 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 anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum amount of texture map elements (texels) that can be processed in one second. This is worked out by multiplying the total number of 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 per second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels the graphics card can possibly record to the local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the number of Render Output Units 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 lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the max fill rate.