GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2 vs GeForce GTX 280

Intro

Compare those specs to the GeForce GTX 280, which has core clock speeds of 602 MHz on the GPU, and 1107 MHz on the 1024 MB of GDDR3 RAM. It features 240 SPUs as well as 80 Texture Address Units and 32 ROPs.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		47 Watts
GeForce GTX 280		236 Watts
	Difference: 189 Watts (402%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce GTX 280 should perform much faster than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2 in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 280		141696 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		12800 MB/sec
	Difference: 128896 (1007%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 280 will be a lot (about 457%) better at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2. (explain)

GeForce GTX 280		48160 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 39520 (457%)

Pixel Rate

If running with a high resolution is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 280 is a better choice, by a large margin. (explain)

GeForce GTX 280		19264 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 14944 (346%)

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 data (measured in megabytes per second) that can be moved over the external memory interface within a second. It is worked out by multiplying the bus width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the card's 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 amount of texture map elements (texels) that are applied in one second. This number is worked out by multiplying the total texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, the better the video 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 amount of pixels that the graphics card can possibly write to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the amount of ROPs by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel rate also depends on lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the maximum fill rate.