GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3 vs Radeon HD 3650 512MB

Intro

Compare all that to the Radeon HD 3650 512MB, which uses a 55 nm design. AMD has clocked the core speed at 725 MHz. The GDDR3 RAM is set to run at a speed of 800 MHz on this card. It features 120(24x5) SPUs as well as 8 Texture Address Units and 4 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3		47 Watts
Radeon HD 3650 512MB		78 Watts
	Difference: 31 Watts (66%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the Radeon HD 3650 512MB should be 14% faster than the GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3 overall, because of its higher bandwidth. (explain)

Radeon HD 3650 512MB		25600 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3		22400 MB/sec
	Difference: 3200 (14%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3 is much (about 49%) better at AF than the Radeon HD 3650 512MB. (explain)

GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3		8640 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 3650 512MB		5800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 2840 (49%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3 should be much (more or less 49%) more effective at AA than the Radeon HD 3650 512MB, and also should be able to handle higher resolutions while still performing well. (explain)

GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3		4320 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 3650 512MB		2900 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 1420 (49%)

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 max amount of data (counted in MB per second) that can be moved over the external memory interface in one second. It's worked out by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory clock speed. In the case of DDR type memory, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that are applied per second. This number is calculated by multiplying the total number of texture units by the core speed of the chip. The better this number, the better the video card will be at handling 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 that the graphics chip can possibly record to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is worked out by multiplying the number of Render Output Units by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel fill rate also depends on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the maximum fill rate.