GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3 vs GeForce GTX 460

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GTX 460, which comes with clock speeds of 675 MHz on the GPU, and 900 MHz on the 768 MB of GDDR5 memory. It features 336 SPUs along with 56 Texture Address Units and 24 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3		47 Watts
GeForce GTX 460		150 Watts
	Difference: 103 Watts (219%)

Memory Bandwidth

Performance-wise, the GeForce GTX 460 should in theory be much superior to the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3 overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460		86400 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3		22400 MB/sec
	Difference: 64000 (286%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 460 should be quite a bit (more or less 338%) faster with regards to AF than the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460		37800 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 29160 (338%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 460 is a lot (approximately 275%) faster with regards to FSAA than the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3, and also capable of handling higher resolutions without slowing down too much. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460		16200 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 11880 (275%)

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 largest amount of information (in units of MB per second) that can be transferred past the external memory interface in a second. It is worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by the speed of its memory. If it uses DDR RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that can be applied in one second. This is worked out by multiplying the total texture units of the card by the core clock 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 per second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels that the graphics chip could possibly write to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the amount of ROPs by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel output rate is also dependant on lots of other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.