GeForce 9800 GT 512MB vs GeForce GTS 450 1GB

Intro

Compare all of that to the GeForce GTS 450 1GB, which has a GPU core clock speed of 783 MHz, and 1024 MB of GDDR5 RAM running at 902 MHz through a 128-bit bus. It also is comprised of 192 SPUs, 32 Texture Address Units, and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce 9800 GT 512MB		105 Watts
GeForce GTS 450 1GB		106 Watts
	Difference: 1 Watts (1%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GTS 450 1GB should in theory be a little bit faster than the GeForce 9800 GT 512MB overall. (explain)

GeForce GTS 450 1GB		57728 MB/sec
GeForce 9800 GT 512MB		57600 MB/sec
	Difference: 128 (0%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce 9800 GT 512MB will be quite a bit (approximately 34%) more effective at AF than the GeForce GTS 450 1GB. (explain)

GeForce 9800 GT 512MB		33600 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTS 450 1GB		25056 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 8544 (34%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTS 450 1GB should be much (approximately 31%) more effective at AA than the GeForce 9800 GT 512MB, and also should be able to handle higher resolutions without losing too much performance. (explain)

GeForce GTS 450 1GB		12528 Mpixels/sec
GeForce 9800 GT 512MB		9600 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 2928 (31%)

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 information (in units of megabytes per second) that can be moved across the external memory interface in one second. It is calculated by multiplying the bus width by its memory clock speed. In the case of DDR RAM, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by 4 instead. 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 can be processed per second. This figure is worked out by multiplying the total 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 per second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the graphics card can possibly record to its local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is calculated by multiplying the number of ROPs 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 fill rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the max fill rate.