GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB vs GeForce 9800 GTX+

Intro

Compare those specs to the GeForce 9800 GTX+, which comes with GPU clock speed of 738 MHz, and 512 MB of GDDR3 memory running at 1100 MHz through a 256-bit bus. It also is comprised of 128 SPUs, 64 TAUs, and 16 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB		90 Watts
GeForce 9800 GTX+		145 Watts
	Difference: 55 Watts (61%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce 9800 GTX+ should be quite a bit faster than the GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB overall. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GTX+		70400 MB/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB		57600 MB/sec
	Difference: 12800 (22%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9800 GTX+ will be much (approximately 51%) more effective at AF than the GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GTX+		47232 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB		31200 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 16032 (51%)

Pixel Rate

If using lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the GeForce 9800 GTX+ is a better choice, though not by far. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GTX+		11808 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB		10400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 1408 (14%)

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 (counted in megabytes per second) that can be transferred across the external memory interface within a second. It is worked out by multiplying the interface width by the speed of its memory. If the card has DDR RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that are 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 video card will be at handling 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 can possibly record to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the number of Render Output Units by the the core clock speed. 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 also depends on lots of other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the max fill rate.