GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2 vs Radeon HD 5750 512MB

Intro

Compare those specifications to the Radeon HD 5750 512MB, which comes with a core clock frequency of 700 MHz and a GDDR5 memory frequency of 1150 MHz. It also uses a 128-bit memory bus, and makes use of a 40 nm design. It features 720(144x5) SPUs, 36 Texture Address Units, and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		47 Watts
Radeon HD 5750 512MB		86 Watts
	Difference: 39 Watts (83%)

Memory Bandwidth

Performance-wise, the Radeon HD 5750 512MB should theoretically be much superior to the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2 in general. (explain)

Radeon HD 5750 512MB		73600 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		12800 MB/sec
	Difference: 60800 (475%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 5750 512MB will be much (approximately 192%) better at texture filtering than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2. (explain)

Radeon HD 5750 512MB		25200 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 16560 (192%)

Pixel Rate

If running with high levels of AA is important to you, then the Radeon HD 5750 512MB is the winner, by far. (explain)

Radeon HD 5750 512MB		11200 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 6880 (159%)

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: Bandwidth is the max amount of data (measured in megabytes per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface within a second. It is worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR memory, it must be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the video card can possibly record to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the number of Raster Operations Pipelines by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel fill rate also depends on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the max fill rate.