GeForce GTX 260 Core 216 vs GeForce GTX 460 (OEM)

Intro

Compare all of that to the GeForce GTX 460 (OEM), which comes with core speeds of 650 MHz on the GPU, and 850 MHz on the 1024 MB of GDDR5 memory. It features 336 SPUs along with 56 Texture Address Units and 32 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 460 (OEM)		150 Watts
GeForce GTX 260 Core 216		202 Watts
	Difference: 52 Watts (35%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce GTX 260 Core 216 should perform a little bit faster than the GeForce GTX 460 (OEM) in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 260 Core 216		111888 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 460 (OEM)		108800 MB/sec
	Difference: 3088 (3%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 260 Core 216 will be just a bit (approximately 14%) better at anisotropic filtering than the GeForce GTX 460 (OEM). (explain)

GeForce GTX 260 Core 216		41472 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 460 (OEM)		36400 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 5072 (14%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 460 (OEM) is quite a bit (about 29%) more effective at FSAA than the GeForce GTX 260 Core 216, and should be capable of handling higher resolutions without slowing down too much. (explain)

GeForce GTX 460 (OEM)		20800 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 260 Core 216		16128 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 4672 (29%)

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 max amount of information (in units of megabytes per second) that can be transferred past the external memory interface in a second. The number is worked out by multiplying the card's interface width by its memory clock speed. If the card has DDR type RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that can be applied in one second. This is worked out by multiplying the total amount of texture units of the card by the core clock speed of the chip. The higher 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 one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels that the graphics card can possibly write to the local memory in a second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The figure is worked out by multiplying the number of Raster Operations Pipelines by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel output rate also depends on many other factors, especially the memory bandwidth - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the max fill rate.