GeForce 9600 GT 512MB vs Radeon R9 M275X

Intro

Compare those specs to the Radeon R9 M275X, which features clock speeds of 900 MHz on the GPU, and 1125 MHz on the 2048 MB of GDDR5 memory. It features 640 SPUs as well as 40 TAUs and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon R9 M275X		50 Watts
GeForce 9600 GT 512MB		95 Watts
	Difference: 45 Watts (90%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the Radeon R9 M275X should be a lot faster than the GeForce 9600 GT 512MB in general. (explain)

Radeon R9 M275X		72000 MB/sec
GeForce 9600 GT 512MB		57600 MB/sec
	Difference: 14400 (25%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon R9 M275X will be a lot (approximately 73%) more effective at texture filtering than the GeForce 9600 GT 512MB. (explain)

Radeon R9 M275X		36000 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9600 GT 512MB		20800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 15200 (73%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon R9 M275X should be quite a bit (about 38%) faster with regards to anti-aliasing than the GeForce 9600 GT 512MB, and also will be capable of handling higher screen resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

Radeon R9 M275X		14400 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9600 GT 512MB		10400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 4000 (38%)

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 (counted in megabytes per second) that can be transferred across the external memory interface in one second. It's worked out by multiplying the interface width by the speed of its memory. If it uses DDR type memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, the better 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 texture map elements (texels) that can be applied in one second. This figure is calculated by multiplying the total number of texture units of the card by the core clock speed of the chip. The higher this number, the better the video card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels the video card could possibly record to the local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is worked out by multiplying the number of colour ROPs by the the core clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel rate also depends on lots of 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.