GeForce GTX 285 2GB vs GeForce GTX 590

Intro

Compare all that to the GeForce GTX 590, which has core clock speeds of 607 MHz on the GPU, and 855 MHz on the 1536 MB of GDDR5 RAM. It features 512 SPUs along with 64 TAUs and 48 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 285 2GB		204 Watts
GeForce GTX 590		365 Watts
	Difference: 161 Watts (79%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce GTX 590 will be 107% faster than the GeForce GTX 285 2GB overall, because of its higher bandwidth. (explain)

GeForce GTX 590		328320 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 285 2GB		158976 MB/sec
	Difference: 169344 (107%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 590 will be quite a bit (about 50%) better at AF than the GeForce GTX 285 2GB. (explain)

GeForce GTX 590		77696 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 285 2GB		51840 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 25856 (50%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 590 will be a lot (about 181%) more effective at anti-aliasing than the GeForce GTX 285 2GB, and also will be able to handle higher resolutions more effectively. (explain)

GeForce GTX 590		58272 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 285 2GB		20736 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 37536 (181%)

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.

One or more cards in this comparison are multi-core. This means that their bandwidth, texel and pixel rates are theoretically doubled - this does not mean the card will actually perform twice as fast, but only that it should in theory be able to. Actual game benchmarks will give a more accurate idea of what it's capable of.

Price Comparison

Specifications

Memory Bandwidth: Memory bandwidth is the max amount of data (in units of megabytes per second) that can be transported across the external memory interface in a second. It's worked out by multiplying the bus width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better 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 texture map elements (texels) that can be applied in one second. This is worked out by multiplying the total number of texture units by the core clock speed of the chip. The higher the texel rate, the better the graphics card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels applied in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the video card could possibly write to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs 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 fill rate is also dependant on lots of other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.