GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB vs GeForce GTX 560

Intro

Compare all of that to the GeForce GTX 560, which uses a 40 nm design. nVidia has clocked the core frequency at 810 MHz. The GDDR5 RAM runs at a frequency of 1001 MHz on this model. It features 336 SPUs as well as 56 Texture Address Units and 32 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB		90 Watts
GeForce GTX 560		150 Watts
	Difference: 60 Watts (67%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically, the GeForce GTX 560 should perform much faster than the GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 560		128128 MB/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB		57600 MB/sec
	Difference: 70528 (122%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 560 is a lot (approximately 45%) better at AF than the GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 560		45360 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB		31200 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 14160 (45%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 560 is much (more or less 149%) faster with regards to FSAA than the GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB, and should be able to handle higher screen resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

GeForce GTX 560		25920 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB		10400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 15520 (149%)

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 max amount of information (measured in MB per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface within a second. The number is worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory clock speed. In the case of DDR memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the bandwidth is, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels that the graphics card could possibly record to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the number of Raster Operations Pipelines by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel output rate also depends on quite a few other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the max fill rate.