GeForce 9800 GT 512MB vs GeForce 9800 GX2

Intro

Compare all of that to the GeForce 9800 GX2, which has a clock frequency of 600 MHz and a GDDR3 memory frequency of 1000 MHz. It also uses a 256-bit bus, and makes use of a 65 nm design. It is made up of 128 SPUs, 64 Texture Address Units, and 16 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9800 GT 512MB		105 Watts
GeForce 9800 GX2		197 Watts
	Difference: 92 Watts (88%)

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the GeForce 9800 GX2 should theoretically be much better than the GeForce 9800 GT 512MB in general. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GX2		128000 MB/sec
GeForce 9800 GT 512MB		57600 MB/sec
	Difference: 70400 (122%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9800 GX2 should be a lot (more or less 129%) more effective at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce 9800 GT 512MB. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GX2		76800 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9800 GT 512MB		33600 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 43200 (129%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce 9800 GX2 should be quite a bit (about 100%) better at FSAA than the GeForce 9800 GT 512MB, and able to handle higher screen resolutions more effectively. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GX2		19200 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9800 GT 512MB		9600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 9600 (100%)

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: Memory bandwidth is the maximum amount of information (measured in megabytes per second) that can be moved over the external memory interface in a second. It is calculated by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory speed. If the card has DDR memory, it must be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that can be applied per second. This figure is calculated by multiplying the total texture units by the core clock 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 applied in a second.

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