GeForce 8600 GT vs Radeon HD 6550M

Place in the ranking	1016	1309
Place by popularity	not in top-100	not in top-100
Power efficiency	3.61	0.47
Architecture	TeraScale 2 (2009−2015)	Tesla (2006−2010)
GPU code name	Lexington	G84
Market segment	Laptop	Desktop
Release date	26 November 2010 (14 years ago)	17 April 2007 (17 years ago)
Launch price (MSRP)	no data	$159

Cost-effectiveness evaluation

Performance to price ratio. The higher, the better.

no data

Detailed specifications

General parameters such as number of shaders, GPU core base clock and boost clock speeds, manufacturing process, texturing and calculation speed. Note that power consumption of some graphics cards can well exceed their nominal TDP, especially when overclocked.

Pipelines / CUDA cores	400	32
Core clock speed	600 MHz	540 MHz
Number of transistors	2,154 million	289 million
Manufacturing process technology	40 nm	80 nm
Power consumption (TDP)	26 Watt	47 Watt
Texture fill rate	12.00	8.640
Floating-point processing power	0.48 TFLOPS	0.07616 TFLOPS
ROPs	8	8
TMUs	20	16

Form factor & compatibility

Information on compatibility with other computer components. Useful when choosing a future computer configuration or upgrading an existing one. For desktop graphics cards it's interface and bus (motherboard compatibility), additional power connectors (power supply compatibility).

Laptop size	medium sized	no data
Interface	MXM-II	PCIe 1.0 x16
Length	no data	170 mm
Width	no data	1-slot
Supplementary power connectors	no data	None
SLI options	-	+

VRAM capacity and type

Parameters of VRAM installed: its type, size, bus, clock and resulting bandwidth. Integrated GPUs have no dedicated video RAM and use a shared part of system RAM.

Memory type	DDR3	GDDR3
Maximum RAM amount	1 GB	512 MB
Standard memory config per GPU	no data	256 MB
Memory bus width	128 Bit	128 Bit
Memory clock speed	900 MHz	700 MHz
Memory bandwidth	28.8 GB/s	22.4 GB/s
Shared memory	-	-

Connectivity and outputs

Types and number of video connectors present on the reviewed GPUs. As a rule, data in this section is precise only for desktop reference ones (so-called Founders Edition for NVIDIA chips). OEM manufacturers may change the number and type of output ports, while for notebook cards availability of certain video outputs ports depends on the laptop model rather than on the card itself.

Display Connectors

No outputs

2x DVI, 1x S-Video

API compatibility

List of supported 3D and general-purpose computing APIs, including their specific versions.

DirectX	11.2 (11_0)	11.1 (10_0)
Shader Model	5.0	4.0
OpenGL	4.4	2.1
OpenCL	1.2	1.1
Vulkan	N/A	N/A
CUDA	-	1.1

Gaming performance

Let's see how good the compared graphics cards are for gaming. Particular gaming benchmark results are measured in FPS.

Average FPS across all PC games

Here are the average frames per second in a large set of popular games across different resolutions:

900p	14 +367%	3−4 −367%
Full HD	19 +375%	4−5 −375%

Cost per frame, $

1080p

no data

39.75

FPS performance in popular games

Full HD
Low Preset

Cyberpunk 2077

4−5

0−1

Full HD
Medium Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey	6−7 +500%	1−2 −500%
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare	4−5	0−1
Cyberpunk 2077	4−5	0−1
Far Cry 5	1−2	0−1
Far Cry New Dawn	3−4	0−1
Forza Horizon 4	2−3	0−1
Hitman 3	6−7 +500%	1−2 −500%
Horizon Zero Dawn	14−16 +367%	3−4 −367%
Red Dead Redemption 2	2−3	0−1
Shadow of the Tomb Raider	8−9 +700%	1−2 −700%
Watch Dogs: Legion	30−35 +371%	7−8 −371%

Full HD
High Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey	6−7 +500%	1−2 −500%
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare	4−5	0−1
Cyberpunk 2077	4−5	0−1
Far Cry 5	1−2	0−1
Far Cry New Dawn	3−4	0−1
Forza Horizon 4	2−3	0−1
Hitman 3	6−7 +500%	1−2 −500%
Horizon Zero Dawn	14−16 +367%	3−4 −367%
Red Dead Redemption 2	2−3	0−1
Shadow of the Tomb Raider	8−9 +700%	1−2 −700%
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt	10−12 +450%	2−3 −450%
Watch Dogs: Legion	30−35 +371%	7−8 −371%

Full HD
Ultra Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey	6−7 +500%	1−2 −500%
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare	4−5	0−1
Cyberpunk 2077	4−5	0−1
Far Cry 5	1−2	0−1
Forza Horizon 4	2−3	0−1
Hitman 3	6−7 +500%	1−2 −500%
Horizon Zero Dawn	14−16 +367%	3−4 −367%
Shadow of the Tomb Raider	8−9 +700%	1−2 −700%
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt	10−12 +450%	2−3 −450%
Watch Dogs: Legion	30−35 +371%	7−8 −371%

Full HD
Epic Preset

Red Dead Redemption 2

2−3

0−1

1440p
High Preset

Battlefield 5	1−2	0−1
Far Cry New Dawn	2−3	0−1

1440p
Ultra Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey	1−2	0−1
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare	0−1	0−1
Cyberpunk 2077	1−2	0−1
Far Cry 5	1−2	0−1
Hitman 3	7−8 +600%	1−2 −600%
Horizon Zero Dawn	5−6 +400%	1−2 −400%
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt	1−2	0−1
Watch Dogs: Legion	6−7 +500%	1−2 −500%

1440p
Epic Preset

Red Dead Redemption 2

4−5

0−1

4K
High Preset

Far Cry New Dawn

0−1

4K
Ultra Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey	1−2	0−1
Assassin's Creed Valhalla	1−2	0−1
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare	0−1	0−1
Far Cry 5	0−1	0−1

4K
Epic Preset

Red Dead Redemption 2

3−4

0−1

This is how HD 6550M and 8600 GT compete in popular games:

HD 6550M is 367% faster in 900p
HD 6550M is 375% faster in 1080p

Pros & cons summary

Performance score	1.37	0.32
Recency	26 November 2010	17 April 2007
Maximum RAM amount	1 GB	512 MB
Chip lithography	40 nm	80 nm
Power consumption (TDP)	26 Watt	47 Watt

HD 6550M has a 328.1% higher aggregate performance score, an age advantage of 3 years, a 100% higher maximum VRAM amount, a 100% more advanced lithography process, and 80.8% lower power consumption.

The Radeon HD 6550M is our recommended choice as it beats the GeForce 8600 GT in performance tests.

Be aware that Radeon HD 6550M is a notebook card while GeForce 8600 GT is a desktop one.

Should you still have questions concerning choice between the reviewed GPUs, ask them in Comments section, and we shall answer.