GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2 vs GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 640MB

Intro

Compare those specs to the GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 640MB, which has GPU clock speed of 513 MHz, and 640 MB of GDDR3 RAM running at 792 MHz through a 320-bit bus. It also is made up of 96 SPUs, 48 TAUs, and 20 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		47 Watts
GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 640MB		143 Watts
	Difference: 96 Watts (204%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 640MB, in theory, should perform much faster than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2 in general. (explain)

GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 640MB		63360 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		12800 MB/sec
	Difference: 50560 (395%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 640MB should be quite a bit (approximately 185%) faster with regards to texture filtering than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2. (explain)

GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 640MB		24624 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 15984 (185%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 640MB should be much (about 138%) more effective at full screen anti-aliasing than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2, and will be able to handle higher resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 640MB		10260 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 5940 (138%)

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 information (counted in megabytes per second) that can be transferred across the external memory interface within a second. It is worked out by multiplying the bus width by its memory clock speed. If the card has DDR memory, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the memory bandwidth, the better 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 are 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 higher the texel rate, the better the graphics card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels applied per second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels that the graphics chip can possibly record to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the amount of Render Output Units by the the core 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 fill rate is also dependant on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the maximum fill rate.