GeForce 9800 GX2 vs GeForce GTX 275

Intro

Compare all that to the GeForce GTX 275, which features a core clock frequency of 633 MHz and a GDDR3 memory frequency of 1134 MHz. It also makes use of a 448-bit bus, and uses a 55 nm design. It is comprised of 240 SPUs, 80 Texture Address Units, and 28 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9800 GX2		197 Watts
GeForce GTX 275		219 Watts
	Difference: 22 Watts (11%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the GeForce 9800 GX2 should perform a bit faster than the GeForce GTX 275 in general. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GX2		128000 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 275		127008 MB/sec
	Difference: 992 (1%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9800 GX2 will be quite a bit (approximately 52%) more effective at AF than the GeForce GTX 275. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GX2		76800 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 275		50640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 26160 (52%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce 9800 GX2 is just a bit (more or less 8%) faster with regards to full screen anti-aliasing than the GeForce GTX 275, and also should be capable of handling higher screen resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GX2		19200 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 275		17724 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 1476 (8%)

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.

One or more cards in this comparison are multi-core. This means that their bandwidth, texel and pixel rates are theoretically doubled - this does not mean the card will actually perform twice as fast, but only that it should in theory be able to. Actual game benchmarks will give a more accurate idea of what it's capable of.

Price Comparison

Specifications

Memory Bandwidth: Bandwidth is the largest amount of data (measured in megabytes per second) that can be transported over the external memory interface in one second. It is worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory speed. If it uses DDR RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels that the graphics chip can possibly write to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is worked out by multiplying the number of ROPs by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel output rate is also dependant on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the max fill rate.