GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 320MB vs GeForce 9800 GT 1GB

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce 9800 GT 1GB, which features a clock speed of 600 MHz and a GDDR3 memory frequency of 900 MHz. It also uses a 256-bit bus, and uses a 65/55 nm design. It is made up of 112 SPUs, 56 TAUs, and 16 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9800 GT 1GB		105 Watts
GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 320MB		143 Watts
	Difference: 38 Watts (36%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 320MB should theoretically perform just a bit faster than the GeForce 9800 GT 1GB overall. (explain)

GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 320MB		63360 MB/sec
GeForce 9800 GT 1GB		57600 MB/sec
	Difference: 5760 (10%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9800 GT 1GB is much (about 36%) better at AF than the GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 320MB. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GT 1GB		33600 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 320MB		24624 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 8976 (36%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 320MB will be a bit (about 7%) more effective at anti-aliasing than the GeForce 9800 GT 1GB, and also will be able to handle higher resolutions more effectively. (explain)

GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 320MB		10260 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9800 GT 1GB		9600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 660 (7%)

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 data (in units of megabytes per second) that can be transported past the external memory interface within a second. It is worked out by multiplying the interface width by its memory speed. If the card has DDR memory, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels that the graphics card could possibly record to its 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 clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel fill rate also depends on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the max fill rate.