GeForce GTX 260 Core 216 vs GeForce GTX 460 1GB

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GTX 460 1GB, which comes with core clock speeds of 675 MHz on the GPU, and 900 MHz on the 1024 MB of GDDR5 memory. It features 336 SPUs along with 56 Texture Address Units and 32 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 460 1GB		160 Watts
GeForce GTX 260 Core 216		202 Watts
	Difference: 42 Watts (26%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the GeForce GTX 460 1GB is 3% faster than the GeForce GTX 260 Core 216 in general, because of its greater data rate. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 1GB		115200 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 260 Core 216		111888 MB/sec
	Difference: 3312 (3%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 260 Core 216 is a little bit (about 10%) better at texture filtering than the GeForce GTX 460 1GB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 260 Core 216		41472 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 460 1GB		37800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 3672 (10%)

Pixel Rate

If running with a high resolution is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 460 1GB is a better choice, by far. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 1GB		21600 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 260 Core 216		16128 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 5472 (34%)

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 max amount of data (counted in MB per second) that can be transported over the external memory interface within a second. It is calculated by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory clock speed. If the card has DDR type RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels the video card could possibly write to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the number of Render Output Units by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel output rate also depends on lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the maximum fill rate.