GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB vs Radeon R7 M260

Intro

Compare those specifications to the Radeon R7 M260, which uses a 28 nm design. AMD has set the core speed at 715 MHz. The DDR3 memory is set to run at a speed of 1000 MHz on this particular model. It features 384 SPUs along with 24 TAUs and 8 ROPs.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB, in theory, should be a lot faster than the Radeon R7 M260 overall. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB		57600 MB/sec
Radeon R7 M260		16000 MB/sec
	Difference: 41600 (260%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB will be quite a bit (more or less 82%) better at texture filtering than the Radeon R7 M260. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB		31200 Mtexels/sec
Radeon R7 M260		17160 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 14040 (82%)

Pixel Rate

If running with lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB is a better choice, by far. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB		10400 Mpixels/sec
Radeon R7 M260		5720 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 4680 (82%)

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 (measured in MB per second) that can be moved across the external memory interface in one second. It's worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by the speed of its memory. If the card has DDR type memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that can be processed per second. This number 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 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 graphics card can 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 fill rate also depends on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the max fill rate.