GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3 vs GeForce GTX 570

Intro

Compare those specs to the GeForce GTX 570, which makes use of a 40 nm design. nVidia has clocked the core speed at 732 MHz. The GDDR5 RAM works at a speed of 950 MHz on this model. It features 480 SPUs along with 60 TAUs and 40 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 570		219 Watts
	Difference: 172 Watts (366%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the GeForce GTX 570 should perform much faster than the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3 overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 570		152000 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3		22400 MB/sec
	Difference: 129600 (579%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 570 is quite a bit (approximately 408%) faster with regards to anisotropic filtering than the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3. (explain)

GeForce GTX 570		43920 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 35280 (408%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 570 should be a lot (more or less 578%) more effective at FSAA than the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3, and able to handle higher resolutions more effectively. (explain)

GeForce GTX 570		29280 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 24960 (578%)

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 max amount of data (measured in megabytes per second) that can be moved over the external memory interface within a second. It's calculated by multiplying the bus width by the speed of its memory. If it uses DDR type RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels the video card could possibly record to its local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the number of Raster Operations Pipelines by the clock 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 rate also depends on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the maximum fill rate.