GeForce 9400 GT 256MB vs GeForce GTX 660

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GTX 660, which comes with GPU core speed of 980 MHz, and 2048 MB of GDDR5 RAM running at 1502 MHz through a 192-bit bus. It also features 960 SPUs, 80 Texture Address Units, and 24 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9400 GT 256MB		50 Watts
GeForce GTX 660		140 Watts
	Difference: 90 Watts (180%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the GeForce GTX 660 should be quite a bit faster than the GeForce 9400 GT 256MB overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 660		144192 MB/sec
GeForce 9400 GT 256MB		12800 MB/sec
	Difference: 131392 (1027%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 660 is quite a bit (approximately 1682%) faster with regards to anisotropic filtering than the GeForce 9400 GT 256MB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 660		78400 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9400 GT 256MB		4400 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 74000 (1682%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 660 will be a lot (approximately 969%) better at anti-aliasing than the GeForce 9400 GT 256MB, and also able to handle higher screen resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

GeForce GTX 660		23520 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9400 GT 256MB		2200 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 21320 (969%)

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 largest amount of information (in units of megabytes per second) that can be moved across the external memory interface in a second. The number is worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by the speed of its memory. If it uses DDR type RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the memory bandwidth, 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 per second. This is calculated by multiplying the total number of texture units of the card by the core clock speed of the chip. The better this number, the better the 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 the graphics card could possibly write to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the amount of ROPs by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel output rate is also dependant on lots of other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the max fill rate.