GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB vs GeForce GTX 460 SE

Intro

Compare all that to the GeForce GTX 460 SE, which comes with clock speeds of 650 MHz on the GPU, and 850 MHz on the 1024 MB of GDDR5 RAM. It features 288 SPUs along with 48 TAUs and 32 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB		84 Watts
GeForce GTX 460 SE		150 Watts
	Difference: 66 Watts (79%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the GeForce GTX 460 SE should be quite a bit faster than the GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 SE		108800 MB/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB		38400 MB/sec
	Difference: 70400 (183%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 460 SE is a bit (approximately 18%) more effective at texture filtering than the GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 SE		31200 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB		26400 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 4800 (18%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 460 SE should be much (about 215%) better at anti-aliasing than the GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB, and also should be capable of handling higher resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 SE		20800 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9600 GSO 1.5GB		6600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 14200 (215%)

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 (counted in megabytes per second) that can be transferred across the external memory interface in one second. The number is worked out by multiplying the bus width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR type memory, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

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

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