GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB vs GeForce GT 440 1.5GB

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GT 440 1.5GB, which features a core clock speed of 594 MHz and a GDDR3 memory speed of 900 MHz. It also makes use of a 192-bit bus, and uses a 40 nm design. It is made up of 144 SPUs, 24 Texture Address Units, and 24 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GT 440 1.5GB		56 Watts
GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB		90 Watts
	Difference: 34 Watts (61%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB, in theory, should be much faster than the GeForce GT 440 1.5GB in general. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB		57600 MB/sec
GeForce GT 440 1.5GB		43200 MB/sec
	Difference: 14400 (33%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB will be a lot (more or less 119%) better at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce GT 440 1.5GB. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB		31200 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GT 440 1.5GB		14256 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 16944 (119%)

Pixel Rate

If running with a high screen resolution is important to you, then the GeForce GT 440 1.5GB is the winner, and very much so. (explain)

GeForce GT 440 1.5GB		14256 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 512MB		10400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 3856 (37%)

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 largest amount of information (measured in megabytes per second) that can be moved across the external memory interface in a second. It is calculated by multiplying the bus width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR type memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the faster 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 number of texture map elements (texels) that can be processed in one second. This is calculated by multiplying the total number of texture units by the core speed of the chip. The better this number, the better the graphics card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels processed in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels that the graphics card can possibly record to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the number of ROPs by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel fill rate also depends on quite a few other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the maximum fill rate.