GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB vs GeForce GT 430

Intro

Compare that to the GeForce GT 430, which comes with core speeds of 700 MHz on the GPU, and 900 MHz on the 512 MB of GDDR3 memory. It features 96 SPUs along with 16 Texture Address Units and 4 ROPs.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GT 430		60 Watts
GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB		84 Watts
	Difference: 24 Watts (40%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB should perform a lot faster than the GeForce GT 430 overall. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB		38400 MB/sec
GeForce GT 430		28800 MB/sec
	Difference: 9600 (33%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB should be a lot (more or less 136%) more effective at AF than the GeForce GT 430. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB		26400 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GT 430		11200 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 15200 (136%)

Pixel Rate

If running with a high screen resolution is important to you, then the GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB is superior to the GeForce GT 430, and very much so. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB		6600 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GT 430		2800 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 3800 (136%)

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 data (measured in MB per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface in one second. It is calculated by multiplying the interface width by its memory speed. In the case of DDR type RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that can be applied per second. This is calculated by multiplying the total number of texture units by the core speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, the better the 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 maximum amount of pixels the video card can possibly write to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the amount of ROPs by the clock speed of the card. 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 rate also depends on quite a few other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the maximum fill rate.