GeForce 9500 GT DDR2 vs GeForce GT 310

Intro

Compare that to the GeForce GT 310, which comes with core clock speeds of 589 MHz on the GPU, and 1000 MHz on the 512 MB of DDR2 memory. It features 16 SPUs as well as 8 Texture Address Units and 4 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GT 310		31 Watts
GeForce 9500 GT DDR2		50 Watts
	Difference: 19 Watts (61%)

Memory Bandwidth

Both cards have exactly the same bandwidth, so theoretically they should perform exactly the same. (explain)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9500 GT DDR2 is a lot (approximately 87%) more effective at AF than the GeForce GT 310. (explain)

GeForce 9500 GT DDR2		8800 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GT 310		4712 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 4088 (87%)

Pixel Rate

If using a high resolution is important to you, then the GeForce 9500 GT DDR2 is a better choice, by far. (explain)

GeForce 9500 GT DDR2		4400 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GT 310		2356 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 2044 (87%)

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 information (measured in megabytes per second) that can be moved across the external memory interface in a second. It's worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory speed. In the case of DDR RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels that the graphics card could possibly record to the local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the the core clock speed. 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 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 max fill rate.