GeForce 9600 GSO 384MB vs GeForce GTX 560

Intro

Compare all that to the GeForce GTX 560, which comes with a core clock speed of 810 MHz and a GDDR5 memory frequency of 1001 MHz. It also features a 256-bit memory bus, and makes use of a 40 nm design. It features 336 SPUs, 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 384MB		84 Watts
GeForce GTX 560		150 Watts
	Difference: 66 Watts (79%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce GTX 560 should be a lot faster than the GeForce 9600 GSO 384MB in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 560		128128 MB/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 384MB		38400 MB/sec
	Difference: 89728 (234%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 560 should be a lot (approximately 72%) more effective at AF than the GeForce 9600 GSO 384MB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 560		45360 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 384MB		26400 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 18960 (72%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 560 will be a lot (approximately 293%) more effective at AA than the GeForce 9600 GSO 384MB, and also able to handle higher resolutions more effectively. (explain)

GeForce GTX 560		25920 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 384MB		6600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 19320 (293%)

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 information (measured in megabytes per second) that can be moved across the external memory interface in one second. It is worked out by multiplying the bus width by its memory clock speed. If the card has DDR type RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum amount of texture map elements (texels) that are applied per second. This is worked out by multiplying the total texture units by the core clock 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 processed in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the video card could possibly record to its local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the amount of ROPs by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel rate also depends on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the maximum fill rate.