GeForce GTX 260 216SP 55 nm vs GeForce GTX 960

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GTX 960, which features a core clock speed of 1127 MHz and a GDDR5 memory frequency of 1750 MHz. It also uses a 128-bit bus, and makes use of a 28 nm design. It features 1024 SPUs, 64 TAUs, and 32 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 960		120 Watts
GeForce GTX 260 216SP 55 nm		171 Watts
	Difference: 51 Watts (43%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically, the GeForce GTX 960 should be a little bit faster than the GeForce GTX 260 216SP 55 nm in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 960		112000 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 260 216SP 55 nm		111888 MB/sec
	Difference: 112 (0%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 960 will be much (more or less 74%) more effective at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce GTX 260 216SP 55 nm. (explain)

GeForce GTX 960		72128 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 260 216SP 55 nm		41472 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 30656 (74%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 960 is a lot (more or less 124%) more effective at full screen anti-aliasing than the GeForce GTX 260 216SP 55 nm, and also capable of handling higher screen resolutions without slowing down too much. (explain)

GeForce GTX 960		36064 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 260 216SP 55 nm		16128 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 19936 (124%)

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 information (in units of MB per second) that can be transferred past the external memory interface in a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the card's interface width by the speed of its memory. If it uses DDR type RAM, 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, HDR and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum amount of texture map elements (texels) that can be applied per second. This is worked out 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 processed in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels that the graphics chip can possibly record to its local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the amount of Raster Operations Pipelines by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as 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 memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.