GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3 vs Radeon R9 M275X

Intro

Compare those specs to the Radeon R9 M275X, which makes use of a 28 nm design. AMD has clocked the core speed at 900 MHz. The GDDR5 RAM is set to run at a speed of 1125 MHz on this particular model. It features 640 SPUs along with 40 TAUs and 16 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3		47 Watts
Radeon R9 M275X		50 Watts
	Difference: 3 Watts (6%)

Memory Bandwidth

Performance-wise, the Radeon R9 M275X should in theory be much better than the GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3 in general. (explain)

Radeon R9 M275X		72000 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3		22400 MB/sec
	Difference: 49600 (221%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon R9 M275X is quite a bit (approximately 317%) better at AF than the GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3. (explain)

Radeon R9 M275X		36000 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 27360 (317%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon R9 M275X should be a lot (more or less 233%) more effective at FSAA than the GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3, and also should be able to handle higher screen resolutions without slowing down too much. (explain)

Radeon R9 M275X		14400 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 1GB GDDR3		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 10080 (233%)

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 max amount of data (measured in megabytes per second) that can be transported across the external memory interface in a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR type RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the bandwidth is, 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 texture map elements (texels) that can be processed per second. This number is calculated by multiplying the total amount of texture units by the core clock speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, the better the card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels applied in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the video card can possibly record to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is worked out by multiplying the amount of ROPs by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel rate is also dependant on lots of other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the max fill rate.