GeForce GTX 295 vs GeForce GTX 660

Intro

Compare those specs to the GeForce GTX 660, which has a core clock frequency of 980 MHz and a GDDR5 memory speed of 1502 MHz. It also makes use of a 192-bit bus, and makes use of a 28 nm design. It is comprised of 960 SPUs, 80 Texture Address Units, and 24 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 660		140 Watts
GeForce GTX 295		289 Watts
	Difference: 149 Watts (106%)

Memory Bandwidth

Performance-wise, the GeForce GTX 295 should in theory be a lot superior to the GeForce GTX 660 overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 295		223776 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 660		144192 MB/sec
	Difference: 79584 (55%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 295 will be a small bit (more or less 18%) faster with regards to texture filtering than the GeForce GTX 660. (explain)

GeForce GTX 295		92160 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 660		78400 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 13760 (18%)

Pixel Rate

If using high levels of AA is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 295 is superior to the GeForce GTX 660, by a large margin. (explain)

GeForce GTX 295		32256 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 660		23520 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 8736 (37%)

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: Memory bandwidth is the max amount of data (measured in megabytes per second) that can be transported across the external memory interface within a second. It's worked out by multiplying the bus width by its memory speed. If it uses DDR type memory, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

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

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