GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2 vs Radeon HD 4870 1GB

Intro

Compare those specs to the Radeon HD 4870 1GB, which has a core clock frequency of 750 MHz and a GDDR5 memory speed of 900 MHz. It also makes use of a 256-bit bus, and uses a 55 nm design. It features 800(160x5) SPUs, 40 Texture Address Units, and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		47 Watts
Radeon HD 4870 1GB		150 Watts
	Difference: 103 Watts (219%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the Radeon HD 4870 1GB should be 800% faster than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2 in general, because of its higher data rate. (explain)

Radeon HD 4870 1GB		115200 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		12800 MB/sec
	Difference: 102400 (800%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 4870 1GB is quite a bit (approximately 247%) more effective at texture filtering than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2. (explain)

Radeon HD 4870 1GB		30000 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 21360 (247%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon HD 4870 1GB should be quite a bit (approximately 178%) better at anti-aliasing than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2, and capable of handling higher screen resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

Radeon HD 4870 1GB		12000 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 7680 (178%)

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 largest amount of information (counted in MB per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface in a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the card's interface width by the speed of its memory. If the card has DDR memory, it must be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the bandwidth is, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that can be applied per second. This number is calculated by multiplying the total texture units of the card 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 in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels the graphics card can possibly record to its local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the amount of Render Output Units by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). 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 ability to get to the max fill rate.