GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2 vs GeForce GT 430

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GT 430, which uses a 40 nm design. nVidia has set the core speed at 700 MHz. The GDDR3 RAM works at a frequency of 900 MHz on this specific card. It features 96 SPUs as well as 16 Texture Address Units and 4 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		47 Watts
GeForce GT 430		60 Watts
	Difference: 13 Watts (28%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GT 430 should theoretically be much faster than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2 in general. (explain)

GeForce GT 430		28800 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		12800 MB/sec
	Difference: 16000 (125%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GT 430 will be a lot (about 30%) more effective at AF than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2. (explain)

GeForce GT 430		11200 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 2560 (30%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2 will be quite a bit (more or less 54%) faster with regards to FSAA than the GeForce GT 430, and able to handle higher resolutions more effectively. (explain)

GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		4320 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GT 430		2800 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 1520 (54%)

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 maximum amount of data (in units of MB per second) that can be transported over the external memory interface within a second. It is worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by the speed of its memory. If the card has DDR type memory, it must be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the bandwidth is, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the graphics card can possibly record to its local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure 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 filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel output rate also depends on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the maximum fill rate.