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GeForce 9800 GX2 vs GeForce GTX 260

Intro

The GeForce 9800 GX2 has a clock speed of 600 MHz and a GDDR3 memory frequency of 1000 MHz. It also makes use of a 256-bit memory bus, and uses a 65 nm design. It features 128 SPUs, 64 Texture Address Units, and 16 ROPs.

Compare those specs to the GeForce GTX 260, which features a core clock speed of 576 MHz and a GDDR3 memory frequency of 999 MHz. It also uses a 448-bit memory bus, and uses a 65 nm design. It is comprised of 192 SPUs, 64 Texture Address Units, and 28 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 260 182 Watts
GeForce 9800 GX2 197 Watts
Difference: 15 Watts (8%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically, the GeForce 9800 GX2 should perform just a bit faster than the GeForce GTX 260 in general. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GX2 128000 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 260 111888 MB/sec
Difference: 16112 (14%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9800 GX2 is much (about 108%) faster with regards to AF than the GeForce GTX 260. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GX2 76800 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 260 36864 Mtexels/sec
Difference: 39936 (108%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce 9800 GX2 will be a little bit (approximately 19%) faster with regards to anti-aliasing than the GeForce GTX 260, and also should be able to handle higher resolutions more effectively. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GX2 19200 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 260 16128 Mpixels/sec
Difference: 3072 (19%)

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

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GeForce 9800 GX2

Amazon.com

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GeForce GTX 260

Amazon.com

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Please note that the price comparisons are based on search keywords - sometimes it might show cards with very similar names that are not exactly the same as the one chosen in the comparison. We do try to filter out the wrong results as best we can, though.

Specifications

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Model GeForce 9800 GX2 GeForce GTX 260
Manufacturer nVidia nVidia
Year Mar 2008 June 16, 2008
Code Name G92 G200
Memory 512 MB (x2) 896 MB
Core Speed 600 MHz (x2) 576 MHz
Memory Speed 2000 MHz (x2) 1998 MHz
Power (Max TDP) 197 watts 182 watts
Bandwidth 128000 MB/sec 111888 MB/sec
Texel Rate 76800 Mtexels/sec 36864 Mtexels/sec
Pixel Rate 19200 Mpixels/sec 16128 Mpixels/sec
Unified Shaders 128 (x2) 192
Texture Mapping Units 64 (x2) 64
Render Output Units 16 (x2) 28
Bus Type GDDR3 GDDR3
Bus Width 256-bit (x2) 448-bit
Fab Process 65 nm 65 nm
Transistors 754 million 1400 million
Bus PCIe x16 2.0 PCIe x16 2.0
DirectX Version DirectX 10 DirectX 10
OpenGL Version OpenGL 3.0 OpenGL 3.1

Memory Bandwidth: Bandwidth is the largest amount of information (in units of megabytes per second) that can be transferred across the external memory interface in one second. It's worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR type memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the bandwidth is, the faster 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 can be applied per second. This number is worked out by multiplying the total texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The better this number, the better the video card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels processed in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the video card could possibly record to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is worked out by multiplying the amount of ROPs by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel fill rate also depends on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the max fill rate.

Display Prices

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GeForce 9800 GX2

Amazon.com

Check prices at:

GeForce GTX 260

Amazon.com

Check prices at:

Please note that the price comparisons are based on search keywords - sometimes it might show cards with very similar names that are not exactly the same as the one chosen in the comparison. We do try to filter out the wrong results as best we can, though.

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