GeForce 8600 GTS vs GeForce GTX 560 Ti

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GTX 560 Ti, which comes with a clock frequency of 822 MHz and a GDDR5 memory frequency of 1002 MHz. It also uses a 256-bit bus, and makes use of a 40 nm design. It is comprised of 384 SPUs, 64 TAUs, and 32 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GTS		75 Watts
GeForce GTX 560 Ti		170 Watts
	Difference: 95 Watts (127%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GTX 560 Ti, in theory, should perform quite a bit faster than the GeForce 8600 GTS overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 560 Ti		128256 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GTS		32000 MB/sec
	Difference: 96256 (301%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 560 Ti should be a lot (more or less 387%) faster with regards to texture filtering than the GeForce 8600 GTS. (explain)

GeForce GTX 560 Ti		52608 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GTS		10800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 41808 (387%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 560 Ti is quite a bit (approximately 387%) faster with regards to full screen anti-aliasing than the GeForce 8600 GTS, and should be capable of handling higher resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

GeForce GTX 560 Ti		26304 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GTS		5400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 20904 (387%)

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 information (in units of megabytes per second) that can be transferred past the external memory interface within a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory speed. In the case of DDR memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the bandwidth is, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that are applied per 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 texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels per second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels that the graphics chip could possibly write to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the number of Raster Operations Pipelines by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the maximum fill rate.