GeForce 8600 GTS vs GeForce 8800 GS

Intro

Compare that to the GeForce 8800 GS, which comes with a clock speed of 550 MHz and a GDDR3 memory speed of 800 MHz. It also makes use of a 192-bit memory bus, and uses a 65 nm design. It is comprised of 96 SPUs, 48 TAUs, and 12 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 8600 GTS		75 Watts
GeForce 8800 GS		105 Watts
	Difference: 30 Watts (40%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce 8800 GS will be 20% quicker than the GeForce 8600 GTS overall, due to its higher bandwidth. (explain)

GeForce 8800 GS		38400 MB/sec
GeForce 8600 GTS		32000 MB/sec
	Difference: 6400 (20%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 8800 GS should be a lot (more or less 144%) faster with regards to texture filtering than the GeForce 8600 GTS. (explain)

GeForce 8800 GS		26400 Mtexels/sec
GeForce 8600 GTS		10800 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 15600 (144%)

Pixel Rate

If using a high screen resolution is important to you, then the GeForce 8800 GS is a better choice, and very much so. (explain)

GeForce 8800 GS		6600 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 8600 GTS		5400 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 1200 (22%)

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 data (measured in megabytes per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface in one second. The number is worked out by multiplying the interface width by its memory clock speed. In the case of DDR type memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The higher the card's memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum amount of texture map elements (texels) that are applied per second. This figure is worked out by multiplying the total texture units by the core clock 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 maximum amount of pixels the graphics card could possibly record to its local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the amount of ROPs by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel rate is also dependant on lots of other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the max fill rate.