GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 320MB vs GeForce GTS 250 512MB

Intro

Compare all of that to the GeForce GTS 250 512MB, which features a GPU core clock speed of 738 MHz, and 512 MB of GDDR3 memory set to run at 1100 MHz through a 256-bit bus. It also is made up of 128 SPUs, 64 TAUs, and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 320MB		143 Watts
GeForce GTS 250 512MB		145 Watts
	Difference: 2 Watts (1%)

Memory Bandwidth

Performance-wise, the GeForce GTS 250 512MB should in theory be a small bit better than the GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 320MB in general. (explain)

GeForce GTS 250 512MB		70400 MB/sec
GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 320MB		63360 MB/sec
	Difference: 7040 (11%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTS 250 512MB will be a lot (approximately 92%) more effective at AF than the GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 320MB. (explain)

GeForce GTS 250 512MB		47232 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 320MB		24624 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 22608 (92%)

Pixel Rate

If using a high resolution is important to you, then the GeForce GTS 250 512MB is superior to the GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 320MB, though not by far. (explain)

GeForce GTS 250 512MB		11808 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 320MB		10260 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 1548 (15%)

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 maximum amount of information (counted in MB per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface within a second. The number is calculated by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory speed. In the case of DDR type memory, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and high resolutions.

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

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