GeForce 825M vs GeForce 8600 GT 512MB GDDR3

Intro

Compare those specs to the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB GDDR3, which has a clock speed of 540 MHz and a GDDR3 memory speed of 700 MHz. It also uses a 128-bit memory bus, and makes use of a 80 nm design. It is comprised of 32 SPUs, 16 Texture Address Units, and 8 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 825M		33 Watts
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB GDDR3		47 Watts
	Difference: 14 Watts (42%)

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB GDDR3 should in theory be much superior to the GeForce 825M in general. (explain)

GeForce 8600 GT 512MB GDDR3		22400 MB/sec
GeForce 825M		14400 MB/sec
	Difference: 8000 (56%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 825M will be a lot (about 57%) faster with regards to AF than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB GDDR3. (explain)

GeForce 825M		13600 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB GDDR3		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 4960 (57%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce 825M will be a lot (about 57%) faster with regards to AA than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB GDDR3, and will be able to handle higher screen resolutions without slowing down too much. (explain)

GeForce 825M		6800 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB GDDR3		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 2480 (57%)

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 maximum amount of information (measured in MB per second) that can be transported past the external memory interface in one second. The number is worked out by multiplying the interface width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR RAM, it 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 AA, HDR and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the video card could possibly write to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated 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 filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel rate also depends on quite a few other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the max fill rate.