Quadro Vs. GeForce

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DerekMecca

Limp Gawd
Joined
Jul 2, 2007
Messages
178
So I'm building a new rig based around 3D applications, and gaming. There is a 3 page thread about it in the general hardware section of this forum.

A few people are telling me that if I want good performance in 3D applications, I need to get the quadro. It's really imprortant to me... that good performance. Yet... I'm a big gamer and am really looking foward to Crysis.

So my question is, if I do get a Quadro, will gaming on my computer really suffer that much compared to having a 8800? On the other hand, will 3D applications really take a hit if I don't get the Quadro? What are the differences between them, and what are the advantages of both depending on what I'm doing with my computer?

Help me decide which to get!
 
I'm not the best person to give advice here on these forums, but I don't have a problem running ps7, autocad 2006, and catia on my computer and I have a x800xl. I don't know what type of things you will be doing though.
 
If you want to play crisis on a quadro, you're going to need to get a 4600 or 5600 card to get the DX10 features. Personally, I'd just go with a 8800 640 mb GTS, if you don't know why you need a Quadro, you probably won't notice the difference. What 3D apps are you planning on running?
 
Do you know that a Quadro card is much more expensive than its equivalence GeForce card? A Quadro card is around 3 times faster than its Geforce equivalence card in professional application because nVidia has crippled the performance of the GeForce cards in professional application. I think that this thread would be interesting for you however you will get a better result with a faster ATi card.
 
I'm not familure with all of the 3D apps, but I will be starting a 2 year degree for computer animation this fall. I'm wanting to practice what I'm working on at school, at home. As well as work on my own projects in my free time.

How much is a Quadro 5600? I don't see them on Newegg. Are they not out yet?
 
Quadro's don't give you better performance in 3D applications so much as they give you better image quality and more accurate representation of the viewport. Their performance in actual rendering is unimportant as the actual frame by frame rendering of the final out put files is all done by CPU and memory. Your video card could be used to assist in this since the Geforce 8 series architecture is general purpose enough to make this a reality, but the software is not designed to do that at present.

The Geforce 8 series will be faster overall than it's Geforce counterparts, but it will sacrifice image quality for speed to a degree. The drivers are designed differently, and there is a huge performance drop on the gaming side when using a Quadro. Let's also not forget the Quadro will be far more expensive.

What I would do is get a Geforce and softmod it to a Quadro since they are the same hardware in the first place.
 
There's really not a huge performance drop with quadros while gaming, you may see a minor performance drop when gaming on a Quadro compared to it's GeForce conterpart, but we're talking 10% at most. My 4500s perform like 7800 GTX 512s except for the slower memory on the quadro.

OP, it sounds like there is no reason for you to go with a quadro, the 5600 runs between 2800 to 3200, if your just a student starting out, stick with the 8800 series. Most likely your school will have run of the mill quadros if they even have them at all.

Also, the 6800 series is the last series of geforce cards that have been successfully modded to quadros.
 
It's very rare - in fact this is the first time ever - that I'd disagree with Dan, but this time I gotta flat out say it: he's wrong.

A Quadro (or even a comparable "regular" Geforce card that's using softmodded drivers as I've talked about and Dan just touched upon) will offer and provide considerably better performance when benchmarked against the same chipset on the "regular" card.

Case in point, as I explained in the thread where DerekMecca is trying to build a 3D animation/graphics workstation, was years ago when I had an FX5900 card that I softmodded to a Quadro FX 3000 - that worked because the FX5900 chipset is what forms the basis of the actual Quadro FX3000 at that time - something else Dan touches on.

The information was posted here in this thread at Guru3D but also in one here at the HardForum later on and I can't find that specific post presently (not even Google at the moment, dammit). My own results, as well as the results of other people that did the softmod way back then confirmed that 3D application performance - and we're not talking about games here, mind you, but pro level applications like 3DStudio, Maya, SoftImage, etc. This isn't about Direct3D performance, nor games, this is strictly about OpenGL performance when running the application and getting the real work done. I'll quote what I said here just for reference:

br0adband said:
From the Guru3D post:
The best possible way to absolutely know it's working as a Quadro FX 3000 is to test it, and the best test for that card is the SPECperf benchmark for OpenGL.

You can find it here:

SPECperf 7.1.1 Full download (280MB)

It's fairly large at 280MB but it's the industry standard OpenGL benchmarking tool. The fastest way to use this SPECperf test to confirm your card is being utilized as a real Quadro FX 3000 is to run just the 3ds test (3D Studio). You don't have to run the entire suite of tests; you can choose All of them or just the specific one you want - in this case, it's the 3ds one.

A normal stock GF FX 5900 would probably score somewhere very close to my GF FX 5900 Ultra which I just tested with the Run3stmax02 module of SPECperf using current Nvidia 56.55 ForceWare drivers and I got this result: 14.32

When I run this card in Quadro FX 3000 mode by reinstalling the older Detonator drivers (an important point I'm about to explain) I get this result: 26.46

Running the card as a Quadro effectively doubles it's pro-level OpenGL rendering power. It's not a gaming card so don't be expecting it to outperform a stock FX 5900 using current ForceWare drivers. Quadros aren't designed for entertainment, for the most part.

Here's the issue with the SoftQuadro4 softmod for turning your GF FX card into a Quadro: You can't use ForceWare drivers with it any longer if you try to use it in Quadro mode. Nvidia makes a killing selling Quadro products to vendors who build cards based on the GPU (which is the NV35GL, standard FX5900 processors are NV35). They understand that people are buying these MUCH cheaper cards and modding them to perform as well as real Quadros so they've incorporated a type of driver protection scheme for some time now which prevents you from using the most current drivers with Quadros.

I'm not going to go into extreme depth here explaining the hows and whys that Nvidia is doing this for, for a more in-depth explanation (at least how I see it) check my post in this thread:

Nvidia and SoftQuadro

I love this card as a Quadro, it definitely helps out dramatically doing my Maya 3D work.

Hope this helps,
br0adband
Click to expand...

Going from 14.32 in that SPECViewperf benchmark to 26.46 is absolutely freakin' phenomenal, and with those results being nearly 3 years ago, today's Quadros would blow that score away easily.

But even so, I was using a video card (the FX5900) that cost me $190 out the door at Circuit City to give me the performance levels of the Quadro FX3000 that at the time was retailing for ~$1500. If you don't consider that better performance in 3D applications - the SPECViewperf benchmark is made up of several of the highest end 3D applications in existence today, including 3DStudio - then I don't know what better performance means to anyone else. Nearly double the performance is pretty damned impressive.

Rendering is cake and basically a background task; what I'm referring to is the ability of having a noticeable difference in performance when it comes to using the 3D application itself for the actual design work the animator/graphics professional is actually doing.

And there's another thing he's mistaken about: the rendering process. Maya can and does actually use the GPU on the video card (if it's supported) for increasing the rendering performance when rendering is called for - so that flies in the face of his statement about Quadros not giving you better performance in the 3D applications. That is an incorrect statement. Hence:

Nvidia's Gelato project which enables the GPU on the video card to be used for final-frame rendering and nearly real-time actual rendering of frames - and it's not all done with the CPU alone.

So yes, Quadros can give you much better performance than the regular "consumer" cards like the 8800 series. I've been telling people this for years now and most don't believe it, but when I build them a box based on either an actual low-end Quadro card or some higher end card softmodded to work as a Quadro, they're simply astonished at the fluid use and smooth functionality of their 3D applications.

Oh, and Gelato? The Pro (pay for play) version only works on Quadros... or softmodded Geforce cards that for most intents and purposes becomes a Quadro. Gelato's hardware requirements are here and you'll note the first item on the list: Nvidia Quadro FX - and again that's for Gelato Pro which is what the pros would be using. Looking down the page you'll note that it does work with any Geforce card - that's the free version of Gelato - over the FX5200 but even so, using a Quadro only improves that performance over the stock chipset on a Geforce card because the regular drivers don't enable the entire OpenGL instruction set.

You can build a workstation with an 8800 and pay through the nose for the card, or get a real Quadro for a similar price (mid-range Quadros are $350-600) and stomp the living daylights out of the 8800 across the board in the real 3D applications like the kind a student or professional animator will use to get the job done.

So... I hope this makes things a bit easier to comprehend and grasp, and sorry I have to disagree, but this time out I just had to speak up since I've been building 3D workstations for this kind of stuff for nearly 14 years. Regular consumer level cards, even the ridiculously and horrendously overpriced 8800 models, simply cannot compare to a real Quadro or a softmodded "Quadro" when it comes to the real 3D requirements of professional animators and computer graphics specialists.
 
Well I am not a 3D Animator, and I hadn't thought about Gellato, but you are right, using that you can get better performance with the Quadro in 3D rendering. I have supported 3D animation workstations before and I've used Quadros in them and I've run the software on Geforce cards and really didn't see a difference. Then again, I am not a hardcore 3D animator either so you might notice things using the software I didn't.

However, the hardware on the Quadros is the same as it is for the Geforce. Softmodding to a Quadro sounds like a great alternative to buying a real Quadro given the likely hood that the OP probably doesn't have the cash for the Quadro.
 
Dan_D said:
Well I am not a 3D Animator, and I hadn't thought about Gellato, but you are right, using that you can get better performance with the Quadro in 3D rendering. I have supported 3D animation workstations before and I've used Quadros in them and I've run the software on Geforce cards and really didn't see a difference. Then again, I am not a hardcore 3D animator either so you might notice things using the software I didn't.

However, the hardware on the Quadros is the same as it is for the Geforce. Softmodding to a Quadro sounds like a great alternative to buying a real Quadro given the likely hood that the OP probably doesn't have the cash for the Quadro.
Click to expand...

QFT!!! Hence me doing that years ago with the FX5900. The primary reason Nvidia and ATI charge such exorbitant prices for the "high end cards" isn't just the increased performance because of unlocked functionality: they do it primarily for the 24/7 technical support they provide for those cards.

There's a big difference between Joe Average, consumer that happens to own a computer powered by an 8800-series video card, complaining about his shitty framerates in WoW or some other game and Joe Professional, 3D graphics expert with a high end 3D workstation card, that's trying to make money using that 3D workstation card and losing money for every minute of downtime he's having because of a driver incompatibility or <insert problem here>.

So if people ever wondered why ATI and Nvidia charge such ridiculous prices for basically the same hardware - now you know. :D
 
As I understand it:

The G80 core has different parts used for the GeForce/Quadro/Tesla lines. Certain features used for the GeForce line are not used in the Quadro/Tesla and vice-versa.
We were described that the core differences between the three lines on the G80 die could be discribed like so:

g80_core.png
- not to scale :)
 
kuyaglen said:
As I understand it:

The G80 core has different parts used for the GeForce/Quadro/Tesla lines. Certain features used for the GeForce line are not used in the Quadro/Tesla and vice-versa.
We were described that the core differences between the three lines on the G80 die could be discribed like so
Click to expand...

I don't know. Typically though the Quadros look identical to their Geforce counterparts as they really are the same hardware.
 
most of the time using a high end gaming card will do the job for *most* professional 3d apps. i'd give the 8800 GTS a shot and if u're having trouble try a softmod.

the reality is that for most apps the geforce cards can get the job done by brute horsepower. they say there is supposedly better image quality with the quadro cards, but i'm skeptical of that. i use a quadro at work and a geforce at home and i can't tell the difference other than the quadro offers 16x AA without the SLI (i use 7900 GTO's at home)
 
I don't think that they would build the core like that. Seems like a waste of die space and I think that the Quadro and the Geforce are the same cards except a few little differences.
 
Dan_D said:
I don't know. Typically though the Quadros look identical to their Geforce counterparts as they really are the same hardware.
Click to expand...

Thats what they were telling us, parts of the core (that each line would not use) would be effectively disabled i assume via bios or whatnot.


Uberbob102000 said:
I don't think that they would build the core like that. Seems like a waste of die space and I think that the Quadro and the Geforce are the same cards except a few little differences.
Click to expand...

Thats what they said they do.
 
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