GeForce 8600 GT 512MB GDDR3 vs Radeon R9 M295X

Intro

Compare those specifications to the Radeon R9 M295X, which makes use of a 28 nm design. AMD has clocked the core speed at 750 MHz. The GDDR5 memory is set to run at a speed of 1375 MHz on this particular card. It features 2048 SPUs along with 128 Texture Address Units and 32 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GT 512MB GDDR3		47 Watts
Radeon R9 M295X		125 Watts
	Difference: 78 Watts (166%)

Memory Bandwidth

The Radeon R9 M295X should in theory be quite a bit faster than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB GDDR3 in general. (explain)

Radeon R9 M295X		176000 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB GDDR3		22400 MB/sec
	Difference: 153600 (686%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon R9 M295X will be a lot (approximately 1011%) more effective at texture filtering than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB GDDR3. (explain)

Radeon R9 M295X		96000 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB GDDR3		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 87360 (1011%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon R9 M295X will be much (more or less 456%) better at AA than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB GDDR3, and also able to handle higher screen resolutions without slowing down too much. (explain)

Radeon R9 M295X		24000 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB GDDR3		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 19680 (456%)

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 (in units of MB per second) that can be transported over the external memory interface within a second. The number is worked out by multiplying the interface width by its memory speed. If it uses DDR memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that are processed in one second. This number is calculated by multiplying the total number of texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The higher the texel rate, the better the graphics 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 maximum number of pixels that the graphics chip could possibly record to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the number of ROPs by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel fill rate is also dependant on lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the maximum fill rate.