GeForce 840M vs GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2

Intro

Compare those specs to the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2, which features core speeds of 540 MHz on the GPU, and 400 MHz on the 256 MB of DDR2 RAM. It features 32 SPUs as well as 16 Texture Address Units and 8 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 840M		30 Watts
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2		47 Watts
	Difference: 17 Watts (57%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically speaking, the GeForce 840M should perform a lot faster than the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2 in general. (explain)

GeForce 840M		16000 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2		12800 MB/sec
	Difference: 3200 (25%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 840M will be quite a bit (about 186%) more effective at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2. (explain)

GeForce 840M		24696 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2		8640 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 16056 (186%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce 840M should be a lot (approximately 91%) better at anti-aliasing than the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2, and also capable of handling higher resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

GeForce 840M		8232 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2		4320 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 3912 (91%)

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 data (measured in MB per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface within a second. It's worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory speed. If the card has DDR type RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels that the graphics card could possibly write to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the number of colour ROPs by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel output rate is also dependant on lots of other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the maximum fill rate.