GeForce 9600 GT 512MB vs Radeon HD 4850 1GB

Intro

Compare that to the Radeon HD 4850 1GB, which comes with a core clock frequency of 625 MHz and a GDDR4 memory speed of 993 MHz. It also features a 256-bit bus, and makes use of a 55 nm design. It is made up of 800(160x5) SPUs, 40 TAUs, and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9600 GT 512MB		95 Watts
Radeon HD 4850 1GB		110 Watts
	Difference: 15 Watts (16%)

Memory Bandwidth

The Radeon HD 4850 1GB should in theory perform a bit faster than the GeForce 9600 GT 512MB overall. (explain)

Radeon HD 4850 1GB		63552 MB/sec
GeForce 9600 GT 512MB		57600 MB/sec
	Difference: 5952 (10%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 4850 1GB will be a small bit (approximately 20%) better at AF than the GeForce 9600 GT 512MB. (explain)

Radeon HD 4850 1GB		25000 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 9600 GT 512MB		20800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 4200 (20%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce 9600 GT 512MB is just a bit (about 4%) more effective at full screen anti-aliasing than the Radeon HD 4850 1GB, and able to handle higher screen resolutions without slowing down too much. (explain)

GeForce 9600 GT 512MB		10400 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 4850 1GB		10000 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 400 (4%)

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 largest amount of data (in units of MB per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface in a second. It is calculated by multiplying the interface width by its memory speed. If it uses DDR memory, it must be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that are applied in one second. This figure is worked out by multiplying the total amount of texture units by the core clock 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 one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels that the graphics card could possibly write to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the amount of Render Output Units by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - sometimes also referred to as Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel fill 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.