GeForce GTS 250 512MB vs GeForce GTX 460

Intro

Compare all that to the GeForce GTX 460, which has core speeds of 675 MHz on the GPU, and 900 MHz on the 768 MB of GDDR5 RAM. It features 336 SPUs as well as 56 TAUs and 24 Rasterization Operator Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTS 250 512MB		145 Watts
GeForce GTX 460		150 Watts
	Difference: 5 Watts (3%)

Memory Bandwidth

Performance-wise, the GeForce GTX 460 should in theory be much better than the GeForce GTS 250 512MB overall. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460		86400 MB/sec
GeForce GTS 250 512MB		70400 MB/sec
	Difference: 16000 (23%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTS 250 512MB is much (approximately 25%) more effective at AF than the GeForce GTX 460. (explain)

GeForce GTS 250 512MB		47232 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 460		37800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 9432 (25%)

Pixel Rate

If using a high screen resolution is important to you, then the GeForce GTX 460 is a better choice, by a large margin. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460		16200 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTS 250 512MB		11808 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 4392 (37%)

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 maximum amount of information (in units of megabytes per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface in a second. It is worked out by multiplying the interface width by its memory clock speed. If it uses DDR type RAM, it must be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the bandwidth is, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the video card could possibly record to its local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the number of 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 output 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 potential to reach the max fill rate.