Quadros compared only viewport performance

[xjapanese]

Hi Guys,

 

I a little lost and want to understand what is the best choice for 3ds max 2011/2012/

vray workstation if I am only interested in viewport performance ( no GPU) working with scenes over 5 milion polygons ( multiple complex objects ).

I want to compare all usable quadros starting from fx 5800 4gb,quadro 4000 2gb,quadro fx 4800 1.5gb, and quadro k2000 2gb.

 

Aprat from Ram how should I compare performance based on what? Again talking only about viewport performance.

 

When talking about viewport performance I am interested not only in frames per second ratio as if I watch that is really misleading. For example even testing fx 512ram card with gtx 1gb card on a complex scene the gtx will show extreme frames rate compared to the quadro but will be absolutely unusable at some complex files when trying to copy and select objects.

 

Thanks

[Zdravko Barisic]

The real power of Quadro, can be seen on huge complex scenes, with 10.000+ objects, and 100 milions of poly.

If you can get it, for some reasonable price, get it. Second hand, refurbished, etc...

But if you buy brand new, I'll still choose GTX series, like 580/660.

1000€+ is not so much worth of it...

[paneli]

Is there a reason to stick with 2011?

Upgrade to 2014 and get a decent GTX. Viewports like rockets.

[xjapanese]

Zdravko,

 

I cuurently have fx 1800 on my Pc ..I can get from a friend quadro 4000 for 280$...can You really handle 100milions?...My fx 1800 has problem with working with 2014..using scene lights is not active and shaded views are all black

 

Ilya..non of the new quadro have any advantages over the gtx if 2014 is used?..I do have to stick to 2011 for a while that is why I am asking..

Edited April 7, 2014 by xjapanese

[Zdravko Barisic]

If you are on max 2011, do you use D3D maxtreme drivers?

FX 1800 is really a little bit old...for nowadays /I had, FX 1500, once...beast in max 2009/.

...

100 milions> Yes, once I had a scene, about 1km x 2km, withe detail plants, etc...it took about 2 bilions of poly.

Ofcourse, that you have to manage with layers, hiden objects, etc...but it still worked.

...

If you have to stick max 2011, than Quadro is not so bad choice, as max 2011, is the last one with maxtreme drivers.

280$ is the max price for quadro 4000, it is about 3 years old gen, so try to get it for some like 150-200€, max.

For your info, he will find no buyer, unless you, believe me.

[xjapanese]

I am on 3ds max 2011 I was using 3ds maxtreme drives with XP I just changed to windows 7 and I still can get the maxtreme driver to install..

..Why 3ds max can not used the 4gb of ram of fx 5800 what were they intended for? and why quadro 4000 with it's 2gb s better ? talking about 2011 3ds max..

[matthewspencer]

$280 isn't terrible. It's true that it's a little old, but buying an old Quadro is sort of like buying an old BMW: you're still getting something decently made.

 

But, it sort of just delays the inevitable. You're going to need a more updated card within a couple years. I second the idea to try and get your hands on a mid- or high-end GTX instead.

[RyderSK]

ld Quadro is sort of like buying an old BMW: you're still getting something decently made.

 

God no, that's horrible analogy here :- D I hope Dimitris sorts this rationally out soon. Buying old quadros is almost akin to buying 2-3 gen old refurbished xeons for price of new i7 workstation, when the performance will be half of it. HW has much shorter moral lifespan than car (like 2-3 years at most compared to 8-10 years for top german cars), after which it's rendered useless to continual performance increase, the type of evolution that doesn't apply to cars at all. You could get muscle cars with high-horse power dating back 50 years, and can use them just fine now, but you can't do the same with Atari and Commodore.

Everyone should read the thread bellow (the SPEC benchmarks) by Dimitris with link to his blog. Must read.

[matthewspencer]

Haha, Juraj, don't take my analogy so literally...it's the best I could do. Obviously the timeline with hardware is quite different from the automotive timeline. Note I still recommended the gaming card in the end.

 

And really the analogy isn't that terrible. Pro cards are supposedly made from the least imperfect parts from the factory. A component with optimal parts isn't going to fail as soon as a component made with sub-optimal parts; this is relatively logical.

 

I'm still recommending a newish GTX over the 4000, but it's silly to say the card is useless. Also, what are you doing to your hardware to only get 2-3 years out of it at most? The onboard graphics of my still-kickin' 2008 Macbook would like a word with you

[RyderSK]

I agree about the technical quality in the sense of how they pick out the best chips of whole trays, and they 'might' last longer. But this sort of quality is important to computer parts that don't affect performance in direct way, those with long moral lifespans, (PSU, Case, etc... Hardisks to certain extent), these can really go for 6 years if you bought the higher-tier.

 

But performance based parts, CPU and GPU, fall too quickly, but it's much more prominent in GPUs, where evolution is really kicking and which double their performance almost each year now and that is what renders them useless for specialized use where the performance is mandatory, while the price of new models stays relatively same for next generation. Because of the heat, they don't even really last that long, so buying 2-3 years old GPU is quite lottery.

 

Regarding Macbook Pro's, Veronika uses one, but we really have to upgrade it almost yearly to keep it up with performance. But that's quite easy since they hold value so well I am always suprised how easy is to sell them. Vanity never dies :- ) [ which is only reason we have one ]

[Dimitris Tolios]

The maxextreme drivers were abandoned for a reason = little to no utility with newer, vastly faster cards.

 

I am a proponent of maximizing what you already have, and if that's 3DS 2011, maxexreme might be relevant to you.

But sticking to "older" hardware in order to do so, might lead to diminishing results. Don't believe that an older card being maxextreme compatible will be faster than the equivalent modern card that is not.

 

In case of the Quadro 4000: it is a decent card still. The K4000 is not a vastly better card and will set you back a minimum of double the money for a 10% or so speed advantage - in some ways not really perceivable.

 

In workloads where the 4000 will be insufficient, most likely the K4000 will be insufficient, and vise versa, where the K4000 is fast, so is the 4000.

 

Now, the question is not splitting hair between mid-range quadros. It is about a relatively cheap GTX, and a "bearably" expensive Quadro, like a used 4000. And it appears to be the case that current versions of viewport engine + current drivers do a pretty good job with low end cards.

I am actually pretty satisfied with the 750Ti's performance with most widespread Arch Viz suites.

 

Yes, it is slower than the Titan across the board in viewports. It is a $150 card.

Yet it is AMAZING in compute. AMAZING. Believe it or not, those "135% better compute per core" numbers nVidia is advertising, well, appear to be true!

 

In openCL and luxrender, using the Luxmark v.2 64bit engine, my Gigabyte 750Ti 2GB WF actually beats the GTX Titan (stock clocks) in the Room scene...the GM107 with 640 (5 SMM units *128) Maxwell cores, beat the 14 SMX * 192 / 2688 core GK110!!!

 

http://pcfoo.com/luxmark_v2_scores/

 

What would a fully blown, 15 SMM (or bigger) with ~ 1920 or more Maxwell compute cores will do?

It appears to be the case that the SMM organization, takes the best parts from Fermi SM (great compute per core, "ok" scalability) and combine it with the lessons learned with the Kepler SMX (much better scalability + consumption, in expense to compute power per core) and delivers it in a very elegant way. We pretty much have the same per-core compute performance we had with GTX Fermi, only now the entry level GTX Maxwell has MORE cores than the hi-end GF110 (GTX 580) had!

 

Sure, the 750Ti turboboosts to 1190 or so MHz pretty much all the time under load, while the stock titan is VERY conservatively clocked (mine OCs to 1200+ MHz on air, compared to the 837MHz stock clock, that's an insane boost in performance), but still...out of the box this 750Ti is a beast, and it can in turn be overclocked to 1320Mhz or so without any hassle and without breaking 60-62oC. It also idles / works on the average "relaxed" viewport sipping power, lower than 3-4% TDP.

Add the fact that the GM107 the 750Ti uses is still 28nm, while by the time we will have a "GM110" or whatever it will be, Maxwell will probably have moved to the 20nm process, we might have even more power shavings, and even better sustained clocks with lower temperatures.

 

Compare that to the Quadro 4000 that idles to 70oC (too hot to touch even @ idle) or pushes 90oC under load, and still scores much less than the 750Ti in SPECviewperf Maya 2013 test, or has 1/3 the compute power, and you can color me impressed!

 

Lets hope Apple will decide to boost a 28 or 20nm Maxwell chip in the next gen MBP, cause it is an embarrassment for a machine that bares the "pro" label not to feature a dedicated GPU before the $2000-2300 price point. Sure, intel HD picks up but...

Edited April 8, 2014 by dtolios

[matthewspencer]

Lets hope Apple will decide to boost a 28 or 20nm Maxwell chip in the next gen MBP, cause it is an embarrassment for a machine that bares the "pro" label not to feature a dedicated GPU before the $2000-2300 price point.

 

That would be excellent. I still haven't found a workstation laptop with build quality that matches the MBP. Please point me toward it if such a thing exists.

[RyderSK]

Jeez, just bought my brother cheapo AMD 260X, if I knew 750Ti is this good, I would reconsider to buy that one instead. He mostly wanted better OpenCL implementation and support for programming though. Can wait to see the rest of the Maxwell lineup unfold.

[RyderSK]

That would be excellent. I still haven't found a workstation laptop with build quality that matches the MBP. Please point me toward it if such a thing exists.

 

Dell Precision m3800 (or the identical XPS15 with GTX instead of Quadro). But it's not THAT pretty as MacbookPro Retina. But it's the second close, in design, and surpassing in everything else (though not by much, not even the price is better much...).

[Dimitris Tolios]

That would be excellent. I still haven't found a workstation laptop with build quality that matches the MBP. Please point me toward it if such a thing exists.

 

Well, are we talking real built quality that leads to reliability and a longer lifecycle, or perceived built quality that is often narrowed to "it has metal body"?

Most companies that offer 1800p laptops, from Yoga Pros to Dell XPSs etc offer comparable build quality, good IPS screens etc.

 

Some of them also come with 1080p screens, that might appear to be falling "short" of the 1800p options, but if you will be using it in windows, might actually be a better option in some cases/apps. Most of the times tho, those screens are TN instead of IPS (as with the non-"retina", 900p MBPs/MBAs).

 

IMHO the MBP meets its match in a lot of laptops as far as real quality. Gets surpassed in a few areas too (keyboard feel, graphics etc). The only "unmatched" figure is battery life, but that involves around and requires OSX too.

The overall package remains very good on the apple side, but for the price "it better be".

Much with the BMW "equivalent" above, lots of the perceived value is simply placebo.

[xjapanese]

Dimitris,

 

Thanks again for the detailed answer you too guys!That is enough information for me !

 

Asus or Gygabite 750Ti ? Does the difference matter?I guess no

Edited April 9, 2014 by xjapanese

[Dimitris Tolios]

Dimitris,

 

Thanks again for the detailed answer you too guys!That is enough information for me !

 

Asus or Gygabite 750Ti ? Does the difference matter?I guess no

 

All are pretty much the same.

Gigabyte's Windforce and MSI "Twin Frost/ZR/crapnaming" (long story short, those with two fans and no shroud enclosing them) are usually the most silent while being the most efficient in cooling.

 

Also, although the reference design 750Ti doesn't have an auxiliary power requirement (the PCB has the points for it, not all card manufacturers put it in), the Gigabyte WF 750Ti I have does have it and won't boot without it. Not that any 6-7yo machine or younger won't have a 6-pin PCIe power connector, but --- just putting it out there.

 

At any rate, doubt that there will be any variation in real - life performance with those cards. Even overclocked, this card runs at low 60s oC. Even with the simplest of coolers the GPU will be cooled fine.

 

A couple of degrees here and there will be most of the difference, and of course pricing, color scheme, fan design etc that are trivial/mater of personal preference and not affecting performance.

I would go for the cheapest available tbh (got the Gigabyte out of curiosity + it was on sale).

 

Right now the 750Ti is part of a promotion that bundles some game codes with each card in some regions.

Often ppl that are not interested resell those to recuperate some costs.

Edited April 9, 2014 by dtolios

[xjapanese]

Thanks Dimitris.Yes The pCie power question first came into mind but saw that my Cl 600w has two pcie though one is required here..

The most silent is what I was interested in too.Thanks I will go for the Gygabite is better priced here too.