GeForce 9600 GT 512MB vs GeForce GTX 460

Intro

Compare all that to the GeForce GTX 460, which features a core clock frequency of 675 MHz and a GDDR5 memory speed of 900 MHz. It also uses a 192-bit bus, and makes use of a 40 nm design. It features 336 SPUs, 56 Texture Address Units, and 24 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9600 GT 512MB		95 Watts
GeForce GTX 460		150 Watts
	Difference: 55 Watts (58%)

Memory Bandwidth

Performance-wise, the GeForce GTX 460 should theoretically be a lot better than the GeForce 9600 GT 512MB in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460		86400 MB/sec
GeForce 9600 GT 512MB		57600 MB/sec
	Difference: 28800 (50%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 460 should be much (approximately 82%) better at AF than the GeForce 9600 GT 512MB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460		37800 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9600 GT 512MB		20800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 17000 (82%)

Pixel Rate

If running with lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 460 is superior to the GeForce 9600 GT 512MB, by a large margin. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460		16200 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9600 GT 512MB		10400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 5800 (56%)

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 largest amount of data (counted in MB per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface in a second. It is calculated by multiplying the interface width by its memory speed. If the card has DDR memory, the result 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 texture map elements (texels) that can be applied in one second. This figure is worked out by multiplying the total amount of texture units by the core clock speed of the chip. The higher the texel rate, the better the graphics card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels that the graphics card could 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 Render Output Units by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel output rate also depends on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.