GeForce 8800 GT 512MB vs GeForce GT 240 GDDR5

Intro

Compare all of that to the GeForce GT 240 GDDR5, which uses a 40 nm design. nVidia has set the core speed at 550 MHz. The GDDR5 memory works at a speed of 850 MHz on this particular card. It features 96 SPUs as well as 32 Texture Address Units and 8 ROPs.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GT 240 GDDR5		70 Watts
GeForce 8800 GT 512MB		105 Watts
	Difference: 35 Watts (50%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce 8800 GT 512MB should perform a bit faster than the GeForce GT 240 GDDR5 overall. (explain)

GeForce 8800 GT 512MB		57600 MB/sec
GeForce GT 240 GDDR5		54400 MB/sec
	Difference: 3200 (6%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 8800 GT 512MB should be much (more or less 91%) better at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce GT 240 GDDR5. (explain)

GeForce 8800 GT 512MB		33600 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GT 240 GDDR5		17600 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 16000 (91%)

Pixel Rate

If using lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the GeForce 8800 GT 512MB is superior to the GeForce GT 240 GDDR5, and very much so. (explain)

GeForce 8800 GT 512MB		9600 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GT 240 GDDR5		4400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 5200 (118%)

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 (measured in megabytes per second) that can be transferred past the external memory interface in a second. It is calculated by multiplying the bus width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR type RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the 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 texture map elements (texels) that can be processed in one second. This figure is calculated by multiplying the total number of texture units by the core 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 processed in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels the graphics card could possibly record to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the number of colour ROPs 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 output rate also depends on quite a few other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the maximum fill rate.