GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3 vs GeForce GTX 550 Ti

Intro

Compare all of that to the GeForce GTX 550 Ti, which comes with GPU clock speed of 900 MHz, and 1024 MB of GDDR5 memory set to run at 1026 MHz through a 192-bit bus. It also is comprised of 192 SPUs, 32 Texture Address Units, and 24 ROPs.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3		47 Watts
GeForce GTX 550 Ti		116 Watts
	Difference: 69 Watts (147%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically, the GeForce GTX 550 Ti should be much faster than the GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3 in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 550 Ti		98496 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3		22400 MB/sec
	Difference: 76096 (340%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 550 Ti is a lot (approximately 233%) more effective at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3. (explain)

GeForce GTX 550 Ti		28800 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 20160 (233%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 550 Ti is a lot (more or less 400%) better at FSAA than the GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3, and also capable of handling higher resolutions better. (explain)

GeForce GTX 550 Ti		21600 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 17280 (400%)

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 information (measured in megabytes per second) that can be transferred past the external memory interface in a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory speed. If the card has DDR memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the bandwidth is, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the video card can possibly write to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the number of ROPs by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel rate also depends on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the maximum fill rate.