GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB vs Radeon R9 380 4G

Intro

Compare that to the Radeon R9 380 4G, which features core speeds of 970 MHz on the GPU, and 1425 MHz on the 4096 MB of GDDR5 memory. It features 1792 SPUs along with 112 Texture Address Units and 32 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB		84 Watts
Radeon R9 380 4G		190 Watts
	Difference: 106 Watts (126%)

Memory Bandwidth

The Radeon R9 380 4G should in theory be quite a bit faster than the GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB in general. (explain)

Radeon R9 380 4G		182400 MB/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB		38400 MB/sec
	Difference: 144000 (375%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon R9 380 4G will be much (approximately 312%) more effective at AF than the GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB. (explain)

Radeon R9 380 4G		108640 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB		26400 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 82240 (312%)

Pixel Rate

If running with a high screen resolution is important to you, then the Radeon R9 380 4G is superior to the GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB, and very much so. (explain)

Radeon R9 380 4G		31040 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB		6600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 24440 (370%)

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 megabytes per second) that can be transported over the external memory interface in one second. The number is worked out by multiplying the interface width by the speed of its memory. If the card has DDR RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that can be applied in one second. This number is calculated by multiplying the total texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The higher this number, the better the graphics 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 number of pixels the video card can possibly record to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel rate also depends on lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the max fill rate.