GeForce 8600 GTS vs Radeon HD 3650 256MB

Intro

Compare that to the Radeon HD 3650 256MB, which features a core clock frequency of 725 MHz and a DDR2 memory frequency of 800 MHz. It also features a 128-bit bus, and uses a 55 nm design. It is comprised of 120(24x5) SPUs, 8 Texture Address Units, and 4 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GTS		75 Watts
Radeon HD 3650 256MB		78 Watts
	Difference: 3 Watts (4%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce 8600 GTS is 25% faster than the Radeon HD 3650 256MB overall, because of its greater data rate. (explain)

GeForce 8600 GTS		32000 MB/sec
Radeon HD 3650 256MB		25600 MB/sec
	Difference: 6400 (25%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 8600 GTS is much (approximately 86%) better at anisotropic filtering than the Radeon HD 3650 256MB. (explain)

GeForce 8600 GTS		10800 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 3650 256MB		5800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 5000 (86%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce 8600 GTS should be quite a bit (more or less 86%) faster with regards to anti-aliasing than the Radeon HD 3650 256MB, and also will be capable of handling higher screen resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

GeForce 8600 GTS		5400 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 3650 256MB		2900 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 2500 (86%)

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 (measured in MB per second) that can be transferred over the external memory interface in a second. It is worked out by multiplying the bus width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR type memory, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher 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 texture map elements (texels) that are applied per second. This figure is calculated by multiplying the total number of texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, the better the graphics card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels processed in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels the video card could possibly write to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is worked out by multiplying the number of Render Output Units 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 fill rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the max fill rate.