GeForce 8800 Ultra vs GeForce GTX 870M

Intro

Compare those specifications to the GeForce GTX 870M, which features a GPU core clock speed of 941 MHz, and 3072 MB of GDDR5 memory set to run at 1000 MHz through a 192-bit bus. It also is comprised of 1344 Stream Processors, 112 TAUs, and 24 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 870M		110 Watts
GeForce 8800 Ultra		171 Watts
	Difference: 61 Watts (55%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce 8800 Ultra, in theory, should perform just a bit faster than the GeForce GTX 870M overall. (explain)

GeForce 8800 Ultra		103680 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 870M		96000 MB/sec
	Difference: 7680 (8%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 870M will be quite a bit (more or less 169%) faster with regards to anisotropic filtering than the GeForce 8800 Ultra. (explain)

GeForce GTX 870M		105392 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8800 Ultra		39168 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 66224 (169%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 870M will be much (more or less 54%) faster with regards to full screen anti-aliasing than the GeForce 8800 Ultra, and also able to handle higher resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

GeForce GTX 870M		22584 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8800 Ultra		14688 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 7896 (54%)

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 (measured in MB per second) that can be transported over the external memory interface within a second. It is worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory speed. If the card has DDR memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that can be processed per second. This is worked out by multiplying the total texture units by the core clock 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 applied in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels that the graphics chip could possibly record to its local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the number of Render Output Units by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel fill rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the max fill rate.