GeForce 8400 GS 512MB vs GeForce GTS 450 1GB

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GTS 450 1GB, which makes use of a 40 nm design. nVidia has clocked the core frequency at 783 MHz. The GDDR5 RAM works at a speed of 902 MHz on this specific card. It features 192 SPUs along with 32 Texture Address Units and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8400 GS 512MB		40 Watts
GeForce GTS 450 1GB		106 Watts
	Difference: 66 Watts (165%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically, the GeForce GTS 450 1GB should be a lot faster than the GeForce 8400 GS 512MB in general. (explain)

GeForce GTS 450 1GB		57728 MB/sec
GeForce 8400 GS 512MB		6400 MB/sec
	Difference: 51328 (802%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTS 450 1GB will be much (approximately 382%) better at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce 8400 GS 512MB. (explain)

GeForce GTS 450 1GB		25056 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8400 GS 512MB		5200 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 19856 (382%)

Pixel Rate

If running with a high screen resolution is important to you, then the GeForce GTS 450 1GB is superior to the GeForce 8400 GS 512MB, by a large margin. (explain)

GeForce GTS 450 1GB		12528 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8400 GS 512MB		2600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 9928 (382%)

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 information (counted in megabytes per second) that can be transferred past the external memory interface in one second. It's worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory speed. If it uses DDR type RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the bandwidth is, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the graphics card could possibly record to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the number of Raster Operations Pipelines by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called 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 memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.