GeForce GTX 260 vs GeForce GTX 260 216SP 55 nm

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GTX 260 216SP 55 nm, which features clock speeds of 576 MHz on the GPU, and 999 MHz on the 896 MB of GDDR3 memory. It features 216 SPUs as well as 72 Texture Address Units and 28 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 260 216SP 55 nm		171 Watts
GeForce GTX 260		182 Watts
	Difference: 11 Watts (6%)

Memory Bandwidth

Both cards have the exact same memory bandwidth, so theoretically they should perform the same. (explain)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 260 216SP 55 nm will be a little bit (about 13%) more effective at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce GTX 260. (explain)

GeForce GTX 260 216SP 55 nm		41472 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 260		36864 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 4608 (13%)

Pixel Rate

Both cards have exactly the same pixel rate, so in theory they should be equally good at at FSAA, and be able to handle the same screen resolutions. (explain)

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 largest amount of data (counted in MB per second) that can be transferred past the external memory interface within a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the interface width by its memory clock speed. If the card has DDR RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

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

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