GeForce GTX 285 2GB vs GeForce GTX 580

Intro

Compare that to the GeForce GTX 580, which features a clock frequency of 772 MHz and a GDDR5 memory speed of 1002 MHz. It also makes use of a 384-bit memory bus, and uses a 40 nm design. It is made up of 512 SPUs, 64 TAUs, and 48 ROPs.

Display Graphs

Hide Graphs

Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 285 2GB		204 Watts
GeForce GTX 580		244 Watts
	Difference: 40 Watts (20%)

Memory Bandwidth

The GeForce GTX 580 should in theory perform much faster than the GeForce GTX 285 2GB in general. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580		192384 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 285 2GB		158976 MB/sec
	Difference: 33408 (21%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTX 285 2GB will be a bit (approximately 5%) more effective at texture filtering than the GeForce GTX 580. (explain)

GeForce GTX 285 2GB		51840 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 580		49408 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 2432 (5%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GTX 580 is a lot (about 79%) more effective at full screen anti-aliasing than the GeForce GTX 285 2GB, and also will be capable of handling higher resolutions more effectively. (explain)

GeForce GTX 580		37056 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 285 2GB		20736 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 16320 (79%)

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 information (in units of MB per second) that can be transferred across the external memory interface within a second. It's worked out by multiplying the bus width by its memory clock speed. If the card has DDR RAM, the result should be multiplied by 2 once again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the bandwidth is, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

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

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the most pixels that the graphics chip could 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 colour ROPs by the clock speed of the card. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel fill rate is also dependant on lots of other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the potential to get to the maximum fill rate.