GeForce GTX 260 vs GeForce GTX 460 SE

Intro

Compare that to the GeForce GTX 460 SE, which features a core clock speed of 650 MHz and a GDDR5 memory speed of 850 MHz. It also uses a 256-bit memory bus, and makes use of a 40 nm design. It features 288 SPUs, 48 Texture Address Units, and 32 ROPs.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 460 SE		150 Watts
GeForce GTX 260		182 Watts
	Difference: 32 Watts (21%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GTX 260 should in theory perform just a bit faster than the GeForce GTX 460 SE overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 260		111888 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 460 SE		108800 MB/sec
	Difference: 3088 (3%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 260 should be a bit (more or less 18%) faster with regards to anisotropic filtering than the GeForce GTX 460 SE. (explain)

GeForce GTX 260		36864 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 460 SE		31200 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 5664 (18%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 460 SE should be much (more or less 29%) faster with regards to FSAA than the GeForce GTX 260, and also will be capable of handling higher screen resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 SE		20800 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 260		16128 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 4672 (29%)

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 max amount of data (measured in megabytes per second) that can be transported over the external memory interface within a second. The number is worked out by multiplying the bus width by its memory speed. If it uses DDR type RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If 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 texture map elements (texels) that are applied in one second. This figure is calculated by multiplying the total amount of texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, the better the card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels processed per 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. Pixel rate is worked out by multiplying the amount of ROPs by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel output rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.