GeForce 840M vs GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB

Intro

Compare those specs to the GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB, which has a clock frequency of 550 MHz and a GDDR3 memory frequency of 800 MHz. It also uses a 192-bit bus, and makes use of a 65 nm design. It is comprised of 96 SPUs, 48 TAUs, and 12 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 840M		30 Watts
GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB		84 Watts
	Difference: 54 Watts (180%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically, the GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB should be much faster than the GeForce 840M in general. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB		38400 MB/sec
GeForce 840M		16000 MB/sec
	Difference: 22400 (140%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB should be a little bit (more or less 7%) better at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce 840M. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB		26400 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 840M		24696 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 1704 (7%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce 840M should be quite a bit (approximately 25%) faster with regards to full screen anti-aliasing than the GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB, and should be capable of handling higher screen resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

GeForce 840M		8232 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB		6600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 1632 (25%)

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

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum amount of texture map elements (texels) that can be applied per second. This number is worked out by multiplying the total number of texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, the better the video card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels applied per second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels that the graphics chip could possibly write 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 clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel output rate is also dependant on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the maximum fill rate.