GeForce 9600 GT 1GB vs Radeon HD 3850 256MB

Intro

Compare those specifications to the Radeon HD 3850 256MB, which features a core clock speed of 668 MHz and a GDDR3 memory speed of 828 MHz. It also features a 256-bit bus, and uses a 55 nm design. It is comprised of 320(64x5) SPUs, 16 TAUs, and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 3850 256MB		75 Watts
GeForce 9600 GT 1GB		95 Watts
	Difference: 20 Watts (27%)

Memory Bandwidth

Theoretically, the GeForce 9600 GT 1GB should perform a small bit faster than the Radeon HD 3850 256MB overall. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GT 1GB		57600 MB/sec
Radeon HD 3850 256MB		52992 MB/sec
	Difference: 4608 (9%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9600 GT 1GB should be quite a bit (more or less 95%) more effective at anisotropic filtering than the Radeon HD 3850 256MB. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GT 1GB		20800 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 3850 256MB		10688 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 10112 (95%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon HD 3850 256MB will be a bit (about 3%) more effective at FSAA than the GeForce 9600 GT 1GB, and will be capable of handling higher screen resolutions more effectively. (explain)

Radeon HD 3850 256MB		10688 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9600 GT 1GB		10400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 288 (3%)

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 information (measured in MB per second) that can be transferred across the external memory interface within a second. It's worked out by multiplying the bus width by its memory speed. If it uses DDR type memory, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If 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 high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum amount of texture map elements (texels) that can be processed in one second. This figure is calculated by multiplying the total amount of texture units 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 processed in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels the video card can possibly record to the local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the number of Render Output Units by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the max fill rate.