GeForce 8600 GTS vs GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB

Intro

Compare those specs to the GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB, which has GPU clock speed of 550 MHz, and 768 MB of GDDR3 RAM set to run at 800 MHz through a 192-bit bus. It also is comprised of 96 Stream Processors, 48 Texture Address Units, and 12 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GTS		75 Watts
GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB		84 Watts
	Difference: 9 Watts (12%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB will be 20% faster than the GeForce 8600 GTS overall, due to its greater bandwidth. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB		38400 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GTS		32000 MB/sec
	Difference: 6400 (20%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB will be quite a bit (approximately 144%) better at texture filtering than the GeForce 8600 GTS. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB		26400 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GTS		10800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 15600 (144%)

Pixel Rate

If using high levels of AA is important to you, then the GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB is the winner, by far. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB		6600 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GTS		5400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 1200 (22%)

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 max amount of data (counted in megabytes per second) that can be transported past the external memory interface in a second. The number is worked out by multiplying the bus width by its memory speed. In the case of DDR memory, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If 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, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels the video card can possibly record to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the the core speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel fill rate also depends on lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the max fill rate.