GeForce 8600 GT 1GB DDR2 vs GeForce GT 130

Intro

Compare that to the GeForce GT 130, which makes use of a 55 nm design. nVidia has clocked the core frequency at 500 MHz. The DDR2 memory works at a frequency of 250 MHz on this particular model. It features 48 SPUs as well as 24 Texture Address Units and 16 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GT 1GB DDR2		47 Watts
GeForce GT 130		75 Watts
	Difference: 28 Watts (60%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce 8600 GT 1GB DDR2 will be 7% quicker than the GeForce GT 130 in general, due to its higher data rate. (explain)

GeForce 8600 GT 1GB DDR2		12800 MB/sec
GeForce GT 130		12000 MB/sec
	Difference: 800 (7%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GT 130 is a lot (more or less 39%) faster with regards to AF than the GeForce 8600 GT 1GB DDR2. (explain)

GeForce GT 130		12000 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 1GB DDR2		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 3360 (39%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GT 130 is a lot (about 85%) more effective at FSAA than the GeForce 8600 GT 1GB DDR2, and should be able to handle higher resolutions better. (explain)

GeForce GT 130		8000 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 1GB DDR2		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 3680 (85%)

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 data (measured in MB per second) that can be moved across the external memory interface in one second. It is calculated by multiplying the bus width by the speed of its memory. If the card has DDR type memory, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels that the graphics chip can possibly write to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the number of colour ROPs by the the core 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 fill rate also depends on quite a few other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the maximum fill rate.