GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2 vs GeForce 9800 GT 1GB

Intro

Compare those specs to the GeForce 9800 GT 1GB, which uses a 65/55 nm design. nVidia has set the core frequency at 600 MHz. The GDDR3 memory is set to run at a speed of 900 MHz on this specific model. It features 112 SPUs as well as 56 TAUs and 16 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		47 Watts
GeForce 9800 GT 1GB		105 Watts
	Difference: 58 Watts (123%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce 9800 GT 1GB should theoretically perform quite a bit faster than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2 in general. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GT 1GB		57600 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		12800 MB/sec
	Difference: 44800 (350%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9800 GT 1GB will be a lot (more or less 289%) faster with regards to texture filtering than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GT 1GB		33600 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 24960 (289%)

Pixel Rate

If running with a high resolution is important to you, then the GeForce 9800 GT 1GB is a better choice, by far. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GT 1GB		9600 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 5280 (122%)

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 max amount of information (measured in megabytes per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface in a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the interface width by the speed of its memory. If it uses DDR RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the bandwidth is, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum amount of texture map elements (texels) that are applied per second. This number is calculated by multiplying the total amount 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 handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels processed per second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the video card can possibly write to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is worked out by multiplying the number of ROPs by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel output rate is also dependant on lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the maximum fill rate.