Video Card Recommendation Needed

[Andrew1]

Hi all,

 

Finally I upgraded my computer ... to p9x79 and 4930k 3.4 - 6 core cpu

and a solid state drive ..., switching from my quad core sock 775 to this new system

it almost feels like I need seat belts to my computer chair, what can I say its an incredible

experience and I finally got a system I always wanted...,

I am running right now an older Radeon HD 4000 series gpu pcie 1, it still performs good for what it is..., however I need to / have to lol get a new gpu , now my questions is go with Radeon or with GeForce? if so what card can someone recommend , I will be using it for 3ds max and Vray, PS, Corel , Vegas, Premiere etc... , is there any specific advantage to pic one make over the other ?, lots of folks swears by GeForce, my Radeon served me very well in the past..., What is it that I should pay attention the most , viewport problems are always common thing with exceeding meshes etc..., I think I need a Larger Memory Volume and a faster bandwidth to resolve the common issues with max's viewport..I was thinking a gpu with at least 3 gigs of memory ..., and lastly what max display driver should I be using ?

any help would be appreciated.

 

thanks,

 

 

thanks.

[AJLynn]

Well, Premiere has I think one feature that's nVidia only ("Mercury" playback) and iray in Max requires nVidia if you want to use it for GPU renders but aside from that Radeons and Geforces are both able to run your stuff. If you don't care about those features and like Radeons, the moderately priced options from the current 7000 series - e.g. the 7850, 7790, 7770 - are all good for most of your likely uses and don't use very much power. I actually have a 5770 on my work PC, which didn't really inspire my confidence at first because I'm running Revit and Max, but it's been fine so far.

[Andrew1]

thanks for the reply,

 

what about active shading Vray RT ?? will that be affected, if I go with Geforce will active shading work better

than with Radeon ??, I am using radeon right now and active shading is working ok, but again my card is old and I am

not sure if there would be much difference, at lease fairly noticeable difference..

and regards to memory, I was thinking gpu with 3 gigs, from time to time I don't mind playing some COD to relax...

[AJLynn]

Only Vray RT-GPU uses the GPU. If you use that, and you're running it on a card that's also the card that's running your monitor, your display will slow down (because the GPU render is hogging the video card resources) so much that your computer will not be able to do much else.

 

If you want to use Vray RT-GPU, one thing you could do is get one modest video card that only runs the monitor, and a second that's got horsepower and is only used by the renderer. You could get, say, a Geforce 760 or 770 with 4GB for the CUDA card and it wouldn't use too much power when idle.

[Andrew1]

I see , I was just reading some specs and Im wondering what is the deal with GTX680, seems like an older model but still holds the price and looking at some benchmarks it outperforms newer Geforce cards..

Well man so many options here, however I just want to settle for a single card, and budget is my issue for now, but will a radeon card perform in par with Geforce regarding RT-GPU rendering or will Geforce have some advantage based on specific drivers I hear about...

 

thanks,

[AJLynn]

If you get a budget card now and add a a second card to boost GPU render performance later, they don't have to be the same. You can choose which processors to send the render task to - so you could have the second card working in combination with the CPU and leave out the card that's running the display (which has the benefit of not slowing your display to a crawl and making the computer unusable while the GPU render runs).

[Dimitris Tolios]

AMD and nVidia seem to "upgrade" their architecture every "other" generation, with minor tweaks in-between, and the possibility for a high-end model being the exception but at a hefty premium (i.e. the GTX Titan, the 780 and the upcoming R9 290X).

All other GTX 7xx series other than the 780 are improved/refined 6xx cards, based on some configuration of the GK104.

 

Most of the times, the best value for money is the x60 or x70 models from nVidia (i.e. the 660 Ti / 670 were much better bang for your $ over the 680). The 760 is now a pretty good deal (tho a 670 is still a tad better if you can get it @ similar price with a 760), and the 660 Ti is probably the only really obsolete card, as the 760 does beat it almost everywhere @ a better price and with better mem bandwidth + cores.

 

The 770 is an exact 680 with 15% faster RAM. Usually you can overclock your 680 to 770 specs easily (and not much higher, the 770 is already pushed close to the limits by the factory, and unless you go for an MSI lighting with a modded bios and off-spec over-volting, most 770s perform the same).

 

All the above goes for "compute" tasks. For viewport acceleration the advantages from one to the other is a tad overrated / exaggerated by most users i.e. the 760 won't be that worse than a 770 or 780 in most cases, and even less will be the difference from overclocking / getting factory overclocked versions of the same card.

 

RAM Usage: I don't tend to see above 1.4~1.5GB or VRam usage, and that includes not just 3DS Max, but also the 300 or so MB that windows pre-allocates from the 1st moment you launch (even with aero off).

 

Also keep in mind that these readings (from GPU-Z or whatnot) are memory allocation. Think of programs as messy teenage girls – give em all the "storage closet" space in the world, and they occupy it almost all in a messy "inefficient way".

 

In reality a good 1GB GPU won’t see really major holdups, even if you see above 1GB allocation most of the time.

 

2GB is a sweet spot though, simply because most cards do offer that in good prices ($140 or more and you should find a good 2GB card).

 

3GB is better – but outside GPU compute, only for 384bit (or better) cards.

 

The 660s with 192bit 3GB configurations, are almost useless for viewports and games as the card cannot access all 3GB of RAM simultaneously.

 

These versions exist to compete "visually" in the eyes of a consumer with the 3GB AMD cards in the same price bracket (which are 384bit).

 

Same goes for 4GB 256bit cards, like all GK 104 based 670/680/760/770s etc. GPU compute doesn’t care that much for the simultaneous access and does benefit, but viewports or display acceleration in general (games) show no performance increase going from 2GB to 4GB in current generation 256bit cards.

 

　

Edited October 18, 2013 by dtolios

[Andrew1]

well today is the day, I am gonna either buy EVGA GTX 770 - x2 gig dram or the Asus AMD Radeon 7970

I understand the cuda drivers for vray gpu rendering but that Radeon card is so much faster with 384 bit transfer topping 316 GB/s memory bandwidth and I'll have additional gig of ram...I mean the radeon card seems so much better but yet its at the same price...

Please help ..., what should I do ??

I will be buying a gpu today after work

 

Radeon http://www.memoryexpress.com/Products/MX42423

GTX 770http://www.memoryexpress.com/Products/MX46285

 

thanks,

 

Drew

 

PS - HELP the clock is ticking ......

Edited October 25, 2013 by Andrew1

[Zdravko Barisic]

nVIDIA, "paper speed" does not effect on you rela viewport performance, it is all about display driver's magic, where nVIDIA, still better works with Autodesk.

So, go for GTX 770, one card, SLI is very very useless for viewport performance, only used in GPU raytrace, but thats not in production renderer, yet.

Good luck!

[Andrew1]

thanks, I ended up buying the GTX770 and I am very pleased,

my question is should I be running DVI or HDMI connection between my 27" monitor ?also regarding 3ds and vegas and ps and rest of my graphic design programs should they be uninstalled and reinstalled considering the new gpu had been installed with the new drivers?

I am using 3dsmax2010 x64 in regards to the viewport performance I am not 100 percent impressed I was expecting a bit better performance from the GTX770 if I reinstall 3ds will I see an improvement in viewport performance or not ?

Sorry for all this perhaps simple questions but last time I upgraded my workstation it had been over 4 years lol,

I am super happy with the system , but not 100 % happy with the gpu..

 

thanks.

 

Drew

[Dimitris Tolios]

thanks, I ended up buying the GTX770 and I am very pleased,

my question is should I be running DVI or HDMI connection between my 27" monitor ?

HDMI cannot do 1440p. All "serious" resolution monitors need DVI-D.

The 27" doesn't say anything, the resolution of the monitor is the question.

Driving a 17" 1080p monitor is as hard as driving a 80" 1080p and vice versa.

 

also regarding 3ds and vegas and ps and rest of my graphic design programs should they be uninstalled and reinstalled considering the new gpu had been installed with the new drivers?

 

No. You don't need to do anything.

For some Adobe programs, you might need to add you card in the "compatibility list" manually in the equiv. txt file e.g.: C:\Program Files\Adobe\Adobe Premiere Pro CS5\cuda_supported_cards.txt

 

I am using 3dsmax2010 x64 in regards to the viewport performance I am not 100 percent impressed I was expecting a bit better performance from the GTX770 if I reinstall 3ds will I see an improvement in viewport performance or not ?

No. Don't think so. GTX cards were mediocre with 3DS forever...

Latest versions (2013/2014) have a powerful adaptive degradation viewport algorithm = the quality of what is displayed is reduced pretty aggressively to keep fps up.

My experience is limited, but I did not see any quality improvement over the 3DS 2012 when switching to 2014. The contrary. 2012 viewport tries to be as "realistic" as possible and fps suffers, while 2014 doesn't hesitate to switch to "proxied" polygons to keep fps up. Depending on your system the result is not always fluid with the latter either: for heavy scenes polygons / textures do take a notable amount of time to re-appear after degraded.

 

Note that my system is a clocked 3930K with a GTX Titan.

 

Sorry for all this perhaps simple questions but last time I upgraded my workstation it had been over 4 years lol,

I am super happy with the system , but not 100 % happy with the gpu..

 

thanks.

 

Drew

 

Well...realistic expectations are required with all our buys.

Even if you had bought a GTX Titan you would not see better results with 3DS Max prior to 2013/2014, and even those would be due to "cheating" of the 3DS. GTX drivers do no favors no matter the raw power available in 3DS.

[Andrew1]

thank you for your extensive and knowledgeable reply,

I was thinking maybe upgrading my old 3ds, what would be the best stable version with the best viewport performance up to date ?

I understand I am quite behind with my software, is it worth it to upgrade from 2010 x 64 version ?, I am not involved into any high end production,

I do model and compose exterior scenes that require lots of vegetation etc and I do a bit of animation but nothing too crazy...

 

thanks.

 

Drew

[Dimitris Tolios]

In a nutshell you will be seeing all these vegetation models going through a second layer of "proxies" (assuming you are using VRay Proxies or some other technique like it?) speeding up your workflow.

 

If you are not using proxies, the 3DS max viewport will "replace" the geometries dropped in your scene with simpler "visual" proxies to allow for better navigation. It is not magic, it has its weaknesses as i've described above, but it is an improvement for most.

 

Certainly a software upgrade like this, for someone who I assume is not part of the Autodesk subscription etc, is a substantial expense that it is NOT required. It is a preference firstly, a necessity secondarily, thus I cannot assume the decision's responsibility.

 

Try to get a hold of a 2014 demo / trial version, and run it for 30 days, or find a colleague that has it so that you can evaluate the new viewport engine 1st hand with real scenes matching your workflow.

Don't let others decide that for you.

[aveshnm]

Hi,

I like the way discussion goin on and really impressed with Mr. Dimitris Tolios as he explained GPU in detail. Actually since a long i am searching for a graphic card for my old system as below

 

CPU - Core 2 Quard Q6600 2.4 GHz

Motherboaed - Asus P5WDG2 WS professional

Memmoey - 8 GB

Graphic card - Quadro FX 3400 with 256 MB Ram. ( This was my previous graphic card which is now not working )

 

Can you people suggest me what should i go for. I read all detailed about GTX and Quadro and i think i should go for GTX 680 with 2GB but still confused.

Basically i want a good workstation. But as this one become very old as speed and performace i am thinking to buy new one with i7 or Xeon + 16 or 24 GB + highend graphic card etc, My actual work is 3D architectural animation and VFX for commercial advertisement. Now suggest me which graphic card should i buy for my old system so i can properly work with it. I dont want to go for graphic card which is higher than my other components like my CPU and motherboard otherwise there will be excessive GPU and ram which wont work ( am I right? ). What about GTX 680 2GB? Please guide me i want to buy it since long and lots of time went wrong. Thank you to all. My main problem is vegitation and rendering with Vray RT

Kindly guide me and thank you for reading my Q, Please answer.

[Andrew1]

Hey all I wanted to report a slight disappointment lol, I was seriously expecting at least a bit better performance out of that gtx770 within the 3ds viewport,

I ran a small test at work today on a quad core I7 with a base intel motherboard video output , no pcie gpu we are still waiting to make a decision

as what gpu to purchase for that work station as it's been rebuilt recently, now I generated a quick scene about 100 speheres approximately 10 million polygons, I started to test the base intel on board gpu rotating the group of spheres I was at constant 7- 15 FPS at 10 mil polygons..., I saved that file and brought that home and I said I am gonna see how much better my new gtx 770 will perform lol to my surprise the scene opened at 1.5 fps after rotating the group of spheres I was getting between 5 and 12 FPS lol , now seriously what is wrong with this thing, this is embarrassing... the base intel gpu outperformed gtx770, I just don't understand how this can be true lol..

Can anyone else see what FPS they get at 10 mil polys ? and what gpu and max version they are using...

This is very interesting topic, the viewport stability and performance is very important I bet to everyone..., we all strive to improve the workstations performance investing money and spending time refining design techniques and coming up with new ideas , technology is evolving and the computers are getting faster however certain things seem like they hardly improve regardless of the technological and computing progress..

I am thinking , maybe quadro is the way to go...

Looking forward to your comments.

 

thanks,

 

 

Drew

[numerobis]

http://forums.cgarchitect.com/73746-graphics-card-benchmark.html

 

it would be nice to have some more input there...

Even if this "benchmark" is very limited and there are many factors (cpu, driver, resolution, max version) that have to be taken into account, it's at least a rough classification.

 

I still don't get why everyone is asking for comparisons but almost no one is participating when it comes to such initiatives...

The more (useful) data, the better...

 

 

Hopefully some day we'll get an automated viewport benchmark for max, but until then i think it's the only way to do it manually.

Edited October 29, 2013 by numerobis

[Andrew1]

http://forums.cgarchitect.com/73746-graphics-card-benchmark.html

 

I still don't get why everyone is asking for comparisons but almost no one is participating when it comes to such initiatives...

The more (useful) data, the better...

 

Hey Numerobis I just tried your file and I am unable to open it with 3dsmax 2010

My comp at work - intel I7 4770 K - 8 gigs of ram, GPU Intel HD 4600 - 3ds max 2010 x64

my personal system at home intel I7 4930 K - 16 gigs of ram, GTX 770 2gigs mem. - 3ds max2010 x 64

Here is my simple test, spheres within the scene - radius 14.5" / 32 Segments closely spaced apart,

total 10201 Spheres, 101 x 101 spheres generated as copies, total of 9,792,960 polygons.

Viewport "Perspective" Shaded no wireframe.

System at work just testing again between 9 and 14 FPS (core 4 slower cpu, less ram, crap for gpu)

System at home between 5 and 12 FPS ( core 6 faster cpu, more ram, good gpu )

 

I just wanted to add last question , would this gpu perform better I think I may just spend the extra dollars and get GTX780 with 384 bit memory interface

http://www.memoryexpress.com/Products/MX45837

Edited October 29, 2013 by Andrew1

[Andrew1]

A quick update..., got the GTX 780 installed all drivers fresh installed , testing the same scene , you won't believe it this gpu performs even worse,

I am getting between 4 and 12 FPS..., I am gonna get a try out ver of 3dsmax 2014 and see how that will behave...

In the mean time what can I say I am not very happy... lol

 

Cheers guys !

[Dimitris Tolios]

Well...2014 might change stuff (not for you, in general), but you had to learn the hard way what we've talking about all along:

GTX weakness is in drivers. Past a certain threshhold of performance (pretty much an entry level GTX) performance gains are a joke for the extra $ required - as far as viewport performance goes.

 

2014 has such an aggressive degradation algorithm that even IGPs/APUs do well - as far as FPS go...FPS is half the story tho...time for the forums to start measuring other responce times and the time it takes for the GPU to start displaying in realistic mode again (cause, when we say "adaptive" we mean, switch w/e geometry gives us trouble to hidden or bounding box).

[e_kondev]

Hi guys,

I'm building almost the same system as Andrew but I'm on a tight budget. I have to choose a cheaper card mainly for 3ds max viewport acceleration. I still don't use RT just because i haven't proper card. I have opportunity to buy quadro k600 for around 150eu or to wait a bit more for something like gtx760 or to wait even more and to buy both. My idea is to use the quadro for viewport and gtx for RT. Is any logic in this ? What can you suggest me ?

Thanks in advance!

[Andrew1]

Sorry for the late reply,

 

I would wait a bit and get the GTX 770, I had that card and it worked great, I added a bit more dollars and swapped it for the GTX 780 with no substantial difference, but I was thinking I am already paying so much for the GPU why not add the extra bit and get the GTX 780 this way I know

I will not be missing anything, the GPU is great , works wonders with video editing and 3d / 2d design and rendering, and on top of that goes nuts with full HD on COD WAW my highly addictive shootout game

 

Make your best choice and if it takes to sacrifice a bit more time do so, I waited 2 years to build my new top end pc and I am super happy with it.., next step will be getting another 16 gigs of ram , rounding up to 32 and I think I'll stay with it for some time...

[joelmcwilliam]

Hi,

 

do you mind answering my question?

 

As far as viewports performance goes in 3dsmax, what can you say about the difference between the hd 4600 igp, gtx 770 and gtx780?

 

Am i correct that you didn't see much difference in viewports performance in 3dsmax? Even with the bigger models?

 

Because that would be great news for a budget build. Thanks in advance.

 

Btw. Glad to see your happy with your pc. Have fun with it.

[Andrew1]

well between the 7700 and 7800 there was not any noticeable difference at all , mind you this was untextured test scene, the same scene was tested on the intel hd 4600 standard display and to my surprise there was very little difference , I actually had a good laugh that I ended up spending almost $600 bucks simply for 5 cent difference to a dollar lol, this to me was a pathetic experience , but I not only bought the card for 3ds I also use it for video editing and there I noticed a big difference, but again I operate on 3dsmax 2010, and the word is that the new releases have a complete new reworked display driver so the experience could be totally different on max 2013, I also still play computer games and the display works flawlessly and amazingly fast on the highest setting , I just bought a used 40" hd led display as secondary screen and this is by far the coolest investment I did , finally I can work textures in PS and see them instantly taking effect in 3ds on the secondary display...

Overall it is a great GPU but is it worth the money ?? If I would do that again I would spend half the cost and go with AMD Radeon instead.

Hope this helps...

 

ANdrew

[joelmcwilliam]

Hi Andrew,

 

Thanks for you reply. You are very helpful and I'm learning a lot.

 

So basically what I could make up from your reply is, if it was only for 3dsmax 2010 you would stick with the hd 4600. Am I correct? Because there wouldn't be any difference in viewport performance between the hd 4600 and a high end gaming card. I saw something similar in another thread where the hd 4600 was just as good as a high end graphics card for viewports performance.

 

http://forums.cgarchitect.com/73746-graphics-card-benchmark.html

 

But because you also use other software the high end gaming card is a solid choice.

 

I did know that for video editing (I presume you are using adobe software) a gaming graphics card would be beneficial.

 

(http://studio1productions.com/Articles/PremiereCS5.htm) .

 

And with the newer Adobe CC software with OpenCL support an AMD card would be preferable to a Nvidia.

 

http://compubench.com/compare.jsp?config_0=11993914&config_1=12081435

 

But may I ask you what would be your main reason to go for the AMD card? Is it the price/performance ratio? And what card would you choose? The R9 270/280/290(X)?

 

O, I really like your choice of your 40" hd led display as secondary screen. But doesn't the low resolution (I believe it is 1920 x 1080) on such a big screen bothers you? It's not like you are counting pixels, right?