GeForce 8800 Ultra vs GeForce GTX 870M

Intro

Compare that to the GeForce GTX 870M, which makes use of a 28 nm design. nVidia has set the core speed at 941 MHz. The GDDR5 memory works at a speed of 1000 MHz on this specific model. It features 1344 SPUs as well as 112 TAUs and 24 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 870M		110 Watts
GeForce 8800 Ultra		171 Watts
	Difference: 61 Watts (55%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce 8800 Ultra should be just a bit faster than the GeForce GTX 870M in general. (explain)

GeForce 8800 Ultra		103680 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 870M		96000 MB/sec
	Difference: 7680 (8%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 870M should be a lot (approximately 169%) better at texture filtering than the GeForce 8800 Ultra. (explain)

GeForce GTX 870M		105392 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8800 Ultra		39168 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 66224 (169%)

Pixel Rate

If using a high screen resolution is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 870M is a better choice, and very much so. (explain)

GeForce GTX 870M		22584 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8800 Ultra		14688 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 7896 (54%)

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 max amount of information (measured in megabytes per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface within a second. It is calculated by multiplying the bus width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR type memory, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum amount of texture map elements (texels) that are 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 this number, the better the graphics card will be at 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 graphics card can possibly record to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the number of colour ROPs by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel fill rate also depends on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.