GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3 vs Radeon HD 3650 512MB

Intro

Compare those specs to the Radeon HD 3650 512MB, which uses a 55 nm design. AMD has clocked the core speed at 725 MHz. The GDDR3 memory is set to run at a speed of 800 MHz on this particular model. It features 120(24x5) SPUs as well as 8 TAUs and 4 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3		50 Watts
Radeon HD 3650 512MB		78 Watts
	Difference: 28 Watts (56%)

Memory Bandwidth

Both cards have exactly the same bandwidth, so in theory they should perform the same. (explain)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3 is a lot (about 52%) more effective at anisotropic filtering than the Radeon HD 3650 512MB. (explain)

GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3		8800 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 3650 512MB		5800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 3000 (52%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3 is a lot (more or less 52%) faster with regards to FSAA than the Radeon HD 3650 512MB, and also capable of handling higher resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

GeForce 9500 GT 512MB GDDR3		4400 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 3650 512MB		2900 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 1500 (52%)

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 largest amount of information (counted in megabytes per second) that can be moved across the external memory interface within a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the interface width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR memory, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the memory bandwidth, the faster 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 number is calculated by multiplying the total amount of texture units by the core clock speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, the better the graphics card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels processed per second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the graphics card can possibly record to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is worked out 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 drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel output rate is also dependant on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the maximum fill rate.