GeForce GTX 460 1GB vs GeForce GTX 470

Intro

Compare that to the GeForce GTX 470, which has GPU core speed of 607 MHz, and 1280 MB of GDDR5 memory running at 837 MHz through a 320-bit bus. It also is comprised of 448 Stream Processors, 56 Texture Address Units, and 40 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 460 1GB		160 Watts
GeForce GTX 470		215 Watts
	Difference: 55 Watts (34%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GTX 470, in theory, should perform a little bit faster than the GeForce GTX 460 1GB in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 470		133920 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 460 1GB		115200 MB/sec
	Difference: 18720 (16%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 460 1GB should be a bit (approximately 11%) faster with regards to anisotropic filtering than the GeForce GTX 470. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 1GB		37800 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 470		33992 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 3808 (11%)

Pixel Rate

If using lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 470 is a better choice, not by a very large margin though. (explain)

GeForce GTX 470		24280 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 460 1GB		21600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 2680 (12%)

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 (in units of megabytes per second) that can be moved over the external memory interface in one second. It is worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory clock speed. If the card has DDR type RAM, the result 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, HDR and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the graphics card can possibly write to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is worked out by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel fill rate is also dependant 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.