GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3 vs Radeon HD 4650 1GB

Intro

Compare that to the Radeon HD 4650 1GB, which has GPU clock speed of 600 MHz, and 1024 MB of GDDR3 memory running at 700 MHz through a 128-bit bus. It also is made up of 320(64x5) Stream Processors, 32 TAUs, and 8 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3		50 Watts
Radeon HD 4650 1GB		55 Watts
	Difference: 5 Watts (10%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3 will be 14% quicker than the Radeon HD 4650 1GB overall, because of its higher data rate. (explain)

GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3		25600 MB/sec
Radeon HD 4650 1GB		22400 MB/sec
	Difference: 3200 (14%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 4650 1GB is a lot (more or less 118%) better at texture filtering than the GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3. (explain)

Radeon HD 4650 1GB		19200 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3		8800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 10400 (118%)

Pixel Rate

If running with a high resolution is important to you, then the Radeon HD 4650 1GB is a better choice, but not by far. (explain)

Radeon HD 4650 1GB		4800 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3		4400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 400 (9%)

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 maximum amount of data (counted in MB per second) that can be transported over the external memory interface in a second. The number is worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory speed. If it uses DDR memory, it must be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the bandwidth is, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels the video card could possibly write to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel rate also depends on lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the max fill rate.