GeForce GTX 260 Core 216 vs GeForce GTX 590

Intro

Compare all of that to the GeForce GTX 590, which uses a 40 nm design. nVidia has set the core frequency at 607 MHz. The GDDR5 RAM is set to run at a speed of 855 MHz on this specific model. It features 512 SPUs along with 64 Texture Address Units and 48 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 260 Core 216		202 Watts
GeForce GTX 590		365 Watts
	Difference: 163 Watts (81%)

Memory Bandwidth

Performance-wise, the GeForce GTX 590 should theoretically be quite a bit superior to the GeForce GTX 260 Core 216 in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 590		328320 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 260 Core 216		111888 MB/sec
	Difference: 216432 (193%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 590 is a lot (more or less 87%) faster with regards to texture filtering than the GeForce GTX 260 Core 216. (explain)

GeForce GTX 590		77696 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 260 Core 216		41472 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 36224 (87%)

Pixel Rate

If using high levels of AA is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 590 is the winner, by a large margin. (explain)

GeForce GTX 590		58272 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 260 Core 216		16128 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 42144 (261%)

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.

One or more cards in this comparison are multi-core. This means that their bandwidth, texel and pixel rates are theoretically doubled - this does not mean the card will actually perform twice as fast, but only that it should in theory be able to. Actual game benchmarks will give a more accurate idea of what it's capable of.

Price Comparison

Specifications

Memory Bandwidth: Bandwidth is the largest amount of data (counted in MB per second) that can be transported across the external memory interface in one second. It is worked out by multiplying the interface width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR type memory, it must be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the memory bandwidth, 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 can be applied in one second. This is calculated 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 in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the video card can possibly write to its local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the amount of Raster Operations Pipelines by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel fill rate is also dependant on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the max fill rate.