GeForce 8800 GT 1GB vs GeForce GTS 250 1GB

Intro

Compare those specs to the GeForce GTS 250 1GB, which has a clock speed of 738 MHz and a GDDR3 memory speed of 1100 MHz. It also uses a 256-bit bus, and uses a 65/55 nm design. It is made up of 128 SPUs, 64 TAUs, and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8800 GT 1GB		105 Watts
GeForce GTS 250 1GB		145 Watts
	Difference: 40 Watts (38%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce GTS 250 1GB should be 22% quicker than the GeForce 8800 GT 1GB in general, due to its higher bandwidth. (explain)

GeForce GTS 250 1GB		70400 MB/sec
GeForce 8800 GT 1GB		57600 MB/sec
	Difference: 12800 (22%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTS 250 1GB should be a lot (about 41%) better at AF than the GeForce 8800 GT 1GB. (explain)

GeForce GTS 250 1GB		47232 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8800 GT 1GB		33600 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 13632 (41%)

Pixel Rate

If running with lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the GeForce GTS 250 1GB is a better choice, by far. (explain)

GeForce GTS 250 1GB		11808 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8800 GT 1GB		9600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 2208 (23%)

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 moved over the external memory interface in one second. It's worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory speed. If the card has DDR memory, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the graphics card could possibly write to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the number of ROPs 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 fill rate also depends on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the maximum fill rate.