GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 320MB vs GeForce GTS 250 1GB

Intro

Compare that to the GeForce GTS 250 1GB, which comes with core clock speeds of 738 MHz on the GPU, and 1100 MHz on the 1024 MB of GDDR3 memory. It features 128 SPUs as well as 64 Texture Address Units and 16 Rasterization Operator Units.

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 1GB		145 Watts
	Difference: 2 Watts (1%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GTS 250 1GB, in theory, should be a little bit faster than the GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 320MB in general. (explain)

GeForce GTS 250 1GB		70400 MB/sec
GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 320MB		63360 MB/sec
	Difference: 7040 (11%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTS 250 1GB will be quite a bit (more or less 92%) better at AF than the GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 320MB. (explain)

GeForce GTS 250 1GB		47232 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 320MB		24624 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 22608 (92%)

Pixel Rate

If running with lots of anti-aliasing is important to you, then the GeForce GTS 250 1GB is superior to the GeForce 8800 GTS (G80) 320MB, though only just barely. (explain)

GeForce GTS 250 1GB		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 largest amount of information (counted in MB per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface in a second. It is worked out by multiplying the interface width by its memory speed. In the case of DDR memory, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the bandwidth is, the faster 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 are processed in one second. This number is worked out by multiplying the total amount of texture units by the core speed of the chip. The higher this number, the better the 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 its local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the number of Raster Operations Pipelines by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the maximum fill rate.