GeForce 8800 GT 256MB vs GeForce GTX 550 Ti

Intro

Compare all of that to the GeForce GTX 550 Ti, which comes with a core clock speed of 900 MHz and a GDDR5 memory speed of 1026 MHz. It also uses a 192-bit bus, and uses a 40 nm design. It features 192 SPUs, 32 Texture Address Units, and 24 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8800 GT 256MB		105 Watts
GeForce GTX 550 Ti		116 Watts
	Difference: 11 Watts (10%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce GTX 550 Ti should be much faster than the GeForce 8800 GT 256MB overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 550 Ti		98496 MB/sec
GeForce 8800 GT 256MB		44800 MB/sec
	Difference: 53696 (120%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 8800 GT 256MB should be a bit (approximately 17%) faster with regards to texture filtering than the GeForce GTX 550 Ti. (explain)

GeForce 8800 GT 256MB		33600 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 550 Ti		28800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 4800 (17%)

Pixel Rate

If using a high screen resolution is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 550 Ti is a better choice, by far. (explain)

GeForce GTX 550 Ti		21600 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8800 GT 256MB		9600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 12000 (125%)

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 maximum amount of data (measured in megabytes per second) that can be transferred past the external memory interface in one second. It's calculated by multiplying the bus width by its memory clock speed. In the case of DDR RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and higher screen 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 texture units by the core speed of the chip. The better this number, the better the video card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels processed in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the graphics card could possibly record to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the amount of Render Output Units by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as 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 - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.