GeForce GTX 460 (OEM) vs GeForce GTX 660

Intro

Compare all of that to the GeForce GTX 660, which uses a 28 nm design. nVidia has clocked the core speed at 980 MHz. The GDDR5 RAM is set to run at a speed of 1502 MHz on this specific card. It features 960 SPUs as well as 80 TAUs and 24 ROPs.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 660		140 Watts
GeForce GTX 460 (OEM)		150 Watts
	Difference: 10 Watts (7%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the GeForce GTX 660 should be much faster than the GeForce GTX 460 (OEM) in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 660		144192 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 460 (OEM)		108800 MB/sec
	Difference: 35392 (33%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 660 will be a lot (more or less 115%) better at AF than the GeForce GTX 460 (OEM). (explain)

GeForce GTX 660		78400 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 460 (OEM)		36400 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 42000 (115%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 660 will be a little bit (approximately 13%) more effective at FSAA than the GeForce GTX 460 (OEM), and also capable of handling higher resolutions without slowing down too much. (explain)

GeForce GTX 660		23520 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 460 (OEM)		20800 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 2720 (13%)

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 maximum amount of data (counted in MB per second) that can be transported past the external memory interface in a second. It's calculated by multiplying the interface width by its memory speed. In the case of DDR type RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and high resolutions.

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

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