GeForce 8600 GS (OEM) vs GeForce GTS 450

Intro

Compare all of that to the GeForce GTS 450, which has core speeds of 783 MHz on the GPU, and 902 MHz on the 512 MB of GDDR5 memory. It features 192 SPUs along with 32 TAUs and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GS (OEM)		47 Watts
GeForce GTS 450		106 Watts
	Difference: 59 Watts (126%)

Memory Bandwidth

Performance-wise, the GeForce GTS 450 should theoretically be quite a bit better than the GeForce 8600 GS (OEM) in general. (explain)

GeForce GTS 450		57728 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GS (OEM)		12800 MB/sec
	Difference: 44928 (351%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTS 450 will be much (about 190%) faster with regards to AF than the GeForce 8600 GS (OEM). (explain)

GeForce GTS 450		25056 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GS (OEM)		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 16416 (190%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTS 450 should be quite a bit (about 190%) faster with regards to anti-aliasing than the GeForce 8600 GS (OEM), and also will be capable of handling higher screen resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

GeForce GTS 450		12528 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GS (OEM)		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 8208 (190%)

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: Memory bandwidth is the max amount of data (in units of MB per second) that can be transported past the external memory interface in a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the bus width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that are applied per second. This figure is worked out by multiplying the total number of texture units by the core speed of the chip. The higher the texel rate, the better the card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels processed in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the graphics card can possibly record to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the amount of Raster Operations Pipelines by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel fill rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the max fill rate.