GeForce GT 420 vs GeForce GTX 460 SE

Intro

Compare those specs to the GeForce GTX 460 SE, which comes with a core clock speed of 650 MHz and a GDDR5 memory speed of 850 MHz. It also makes use of a 256-bit memory bus, and uses a 40 nm design. It features 288 SPUs, 48 TAUs, and 32 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GT 420		50 Watts
GeForce GTX 460 SE		150 Watts
	Difference: 100 Watts (200%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce GTX 460 SE should be 278% quicker than the GeForce GT 420 overall, because of its greater data rate. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 SE		108800 MB/sec
GeForce GT 420		28800 MB/sec
	Difference: 80000 (278%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 460 SE should be a lot (more or less 457%) faster with regards to anisotropic filtering than the GeForce GT 420. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 SE		31200 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GT 420		5600 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 25600 (457%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 460 SE is quite a bit (approximately 643%) better at FSAA than the GeForce GT 420, and also will be capable of handling higher screen resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 SE		20800 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GT 420		2800 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 18000 (643%)

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 information (in units of megabytes per second) that can be transferred past the external memory interface in one second. The number is calculated by multiplying the interface width by its memory speed. If the card has DDR type RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the memory bandwidth, the better 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 can be applied per second. This figure is worked out by multiplying the total amount of texture units of the card by the core clock speed of the chip. The higher the texel rate, the better the video card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels applied in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels the video card can possibly record to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated 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 outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel rate is also dependant on lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the maximum fill rate.