GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2 vs Radeon HD 5450

Intro

Compare all that to the Radeon HD 5450, which has a core clock frequency of 650 MHz and a DDR3 memory speed of 800 MHz. It also features a 64-bit memory bus, and uses a 40 nm design. It is comprised of 80(16x5) SPUs, 8 Texture Address Units, and 4 Raster Operation Units.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

Radeon HD 5450		19 Watts
GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2		47 Watts
	Difference: 28 Watts (147%)

Memory Bandwidth

Both cards have exactly the same memory bandwidth, so theoretically they should have the same performance. (explain)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2 should be much (more or less 66%) faster with regards to texture filtering than the Radeon HD 5450. (explain)

GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2		8640 Mtexels/sec
Radeon HD 5450		5200 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 3440 (66%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2 should be much (about 66%) more effective at FSAA than the Radeon HD 5450, and should be capable of handling higher screen resolutions without slowing down too much. (explain)

GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR2		4320 Mpixels/sec
Radeon HD 5450		2600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 1720 (66%)

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 maximum amount of data (in units of MB per second) that can be transported over the external memory interface in a second. The number is worked out by multiplying the bus width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR memory, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum amount of texture map elements (texels) that can be applied per second. This is calculated by multiplying the total number of texture units of the card by the core speed of the chip. The higher this number, the better the card will be at handling texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels applied in a second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the video card could possibly record to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is calculated by multiplying the number of Render Output Units by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - aka Render Output Units) are responsible for outputting the pixels (image) to the screen. The actual pixel output rate also depends on quite a few other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the ability to get to the maximum fill rate.