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GeForce 9600 GT 512MB vs Radeon HD 4850 512MB

Intro

The GeForce 9600 GT 512MB has a GPU clock speed of 650 MHz, and the 512 MB of GDDR3 memory runs at 900 MHz through a 256-bit bus. It also is comprised of 64 SPUs, 32 TAUs, and 16 Raster Operation Units.

Compare all that to the Radeon HD 4850 512MB, which makes use of a 55 nm design. AMD has clocked the core speed at 625 MHz. The GDDR3 RAM runs at a speed of 993 MHz on this model. It features 800(160x5) SPUs along with 40 Texture Address Units and 16 Rasterization Operator Units.

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9600 GT 512MB 95 Watts
Radeon HD 4850 512MB 110 Watts
Difference: 15 Watts (16%)

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the Radeon HD 4850 512MB should in theory be a little bit better than the GeForce 9600 GT 512MB in general. (explain)

Radeon HD 4850 512MB 63552 MB/sec
GeForce 9600 GT 512MB 57600 MB/sec
Difference: 5952 (10%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 4850 512MB is just a bit (more or less 20%) faster with regards to AF than the GeForce 9600 GT 512MB. (explain)

Radeon HD 4850 512MB 25000 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9600 GT 512MB 20800 Mtexels/sec
Difference: 4200 (20%)

Pixel Rate

If using a high resolution is important to you, then the GeForce 9600 GT 512MB is the winner, but not by far. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GT 512MB 10400 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4850 512MB 10000 Mpixels/sec
Difference: 400 (4%)

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

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GeForce 9600 GT 512MB

Amazon.com

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Radeon HD 4850 512MB

Amazon.com

Check prices at:

Please note that the price comparisons are based on search keywords - sometimes it might show cards with very similar names that are not exactly the same as the one chosen in the comparison. We do try to filter out the wrong results as best we can, though.

Specifications

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Model GeForce 9600 GT 512MB Radeon HD 4850 512MB
Manufacturer nVidia AMD
Year Feb 2008 Jun 25, 2008
Code Name G94a/b RV770 PRO
Memory 512 MB 512 MB
Core Speed 650 MHz 625 MHz
Memory Speed 1800 MHz 1986 MHz
Power (Max TDP) 95 watts 110 watts
Bandwidth 57600 MB/sec 63552 MB/sec
Texel Rate 20800 Mtexels/sec 25000 Mtexels/sec
Pixel Rate 10400 Mpixels/sec 10000 Mpixels/sec
Unified Shaders 64 800(160x5)
Texture Mapping Units 32 40
Render Output Units 16 16
Bus Type GDDR3 GDDR3
Bus Width 256-bit 256-bit
Fab Process 65/55 nm 55 nm
Transistors 505 million 956 million
Bus PCIe x16 2.0 PCIe 2.0 x16
DirectX Version DirectX 10 DirectX 10.1
OpenGL Version OpenGL 3.0 OpenGL 3.0

Memory Bandwidth: Memory bandwidth is the largest amount of data (measured in MB per second) that can be transferred across the external memory interface within a second. It's worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory clock speed. In the case of DDR type RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the video card could possibly write to the local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the amount of Render Output Units by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel fill rate is also dependant on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the maximum fill rate.

Display Prices

Hide Prices

GeForce 9600 GT 512MB

Amazon.com

Check prices at:

Radeon HD 4850 512MB

Amazon.com

Check prices at:

Please note that the price comparisons are based on search keywords - sometimes it might show cards with very similar names that are not exactly the same as the one chosen in the comparison. We do try to filter out the wrong results as best we can, though.

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