GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2 vs GeForce GTX 460

Intro

Compare those specs to the GeForce GTX 460, which comes with GPU clock speed of 675 MHz, and 768 MB of GDDR5 RAM running at 900 MHz through a 192-bit bus. It also features 336 SPUs, 56 TAUs, and 24 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		47 Watts
GeForce GTX 460		150 Watts
	Difference: 103 Watts (219%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the GeForce GTX 460 should be a lot faster than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2 in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460		86400 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		12800 MB/sec
	Difference: 73600 (575%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 460 is much (more or less 338%) faster with regards to anisotropic filtering than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460		37800 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 29160 (338%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 460 will be much (about 275%) faster with regards to anti-aliasing than the GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2, and also will be able to handle higher screen resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460		16200 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2		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 one second. The number is calculated by multiplying the card's interface width by the speed of its memory. If it uses DDR RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher 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 in one second. This number is calculated by multiplying the total texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The higher the texel rate, the better the card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels processed in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels the video card could possibly write to its local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is worked out by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel fill rate also depends on lots of other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the maximum fill rate.