GeForce 820M vs GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2

Intro

Compare all that to the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2, which features a GPU core clock speed of 540 MHz, and 512 MB of DDR2 RAM running at 400 MHz through a 128-bit bus. It also is comprised of 32 SPUs, 16 Texture Address Units, and 8 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 820M		15 Watts
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		47 Watts
	Difference: 32 Watts (213%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically, the GeForce 820M should perform a lot faster than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2 in general. (explain)

GeForce 820M		16000 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		12800 MB/sec
	Difference: 3200 (25%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 820M will be quite a bit (approximately 33%) more effective at AF than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2. (explain)

GeForce 820M		11504 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 2864 (33%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2 is much (approximately 50%) faster with regards to anti-aliasing than the GeForce 820M, and also capable of handling higher screen resolutions without slowing down too much. (explain)

GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		4320 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 820M		2876 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 1444 (50%)

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 (counted in MB per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface in a second. It is worked out by multiplying the bus width by its memory speed. In the case of DDR RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the bandwidth is, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum amount of texture map elements (texels) that are applied 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 better this number, the better the 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 that the graphics chip could possibly record to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the number of ROPs by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel output rate is also dependant on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.