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Firepro, Quadro or consumer card?

ajf

ajf

ajf

Soldato
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I am trying to understand where all these cards fit in.
We need a machine at work for 3D rendering and video editing.
Some say get the Quadro or Firepro cards, others consumer cards such as R290 etc.
The Quadro etc are quite pricey but on paper specs seem quite low.
For example the R290x and W7100 Firepro.

What are the advantages and disadvantages or each type?
Presumably the Quadro and Firepro cards are optimized for different things to consumer cards?
 
ajf said:
What are the advantages and disadvantages or each type?
Presumably the Quadro and Firepro cards are optimized for different things to consumer cards?
Click to expand...

The main advantages of the Quadro and Firepro cards are the drivers go through more rigorous testing and certification process with industry standard apps such as 3DS Max, AutoCAD, Maya, Adobe Photoshop and SolidWorks - this is where most of the extra cost comes from, the hardware is largely identical (or even a generation behind) current consumer cards, although there is normally more option with regards to cards that have more memory or more display outputs than their consumer model.
 
The AMD cards with GPU compute (GCN) are better price/performance wise. I think most of the 3D applications are optimized for OpenCL (AMD) but some have caught up with CUDA (Nvida) support.

Generally the AMD cards will be lower cost and even the consumer cards perform well in most apps.

Have a look here and choose depending on the 3D apps you will be using :-

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/best-workstation-graphics-card,3493-7.html
 
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Also, the Professional cards come with Error correction. They tend to have better OpenGL support for professional applications and less rendering artifacts. Especially when it comes to wiremesh views.
 
They are generally covered by a superior level of warranty as well. At least they were a few years ago..
 
You will also get a lot more track with the ISV regarding software issues if you are using drivers they have certified.
 
Unless the work is critical (medical, architectural etc) then a consumer card will have an awful lot more power per £ than a professional workstation card. The workstation cards have more stable drivers and have better error correction so are better suited for very high precision work. If it's 3d rendering, animation, video editing etc then a consumer card should be fine and a lot cheaper.

No need to go all out on the top end gpu either unless you're running a seriously high end system - http://ppbm7.com/index.php/tweakers-page/83-balanced-systems/94-balanced-systems
 
The professional cards usually support 10 bit colour whereas the consumer cards only support 8 bit colour.
 
As has been said there are a variety of extra features available on the professional cards, mostly features that are blocked or not enabled via drivers on consumer cards.

The professional cards tend to be clocked slightly slower (more stability) and sometimes are even a generation behind for various reasons such as double precision.

If you don't know of a feature you need that is on a professional card, you probably don't need a professional card.
 
Thanks for all the replies. Some interesting information which I will also note for future!
I think for our use then we will get a decent consumer card.
It is definitely non critical and the software has previously been OK on a consumer card- Maxwell Render, Blender and Adobe Premiere.
The Premiere suite also specifically supports without a 'fix' the R9 290X so this is what we are now looking at.
Also limited by availability as it has to be Dell supplied...

Probably with a 6 core i7 or Xeon as they all support multi core to some degree.
 
I've just replaced some aging Dell T1600 cad workstations (xeon E3-1245, 16gb ram, Quadro 2000, 256gb ssd) with...
X99, 5820k, 32gb ram, 512Gb m.2 ssd, GTX980. The difference as one might expect is phenomenal.
OCUK built the rigs for me :)
Dell wanted to sell me Precision Tower 5810 XCTO: E5-1850, 32gb ram, Quadro K2200, 256GB ssd, for about the same price.
But i chose the X99 GTX980 for the extra cuda cores and power it offers.
 
Banzai_Joe said:
I've just replaced some aging Dell T1600 cad workstations (xeon E3-1245, 16gb ram, Quadro 2000, 256gb ssd) with...
X99, 5820k, 32gb ram, 512Gb m.2 ssd, GTX980. The difference as one might expect is phenomenal.
Click to expand...

80% of the difference would be from upgrading the Quadro though - 192 cuda cores vs 2048 of the 980!

Banzai_Joe said:
But i chose the X99 GTX980 for the extra cuda cores and power it offers.
Click to expand...

:confused: But you could have just fitted a 980 to the previous one - if the GPU provides so much speedup by having more cuda cores, then I doubt you are cpu limited.
 
No need to go mad on a GPU either. Contrary to popular belief just cramming the most powerful card you can in your system doesn't always help render times. You need more CPU power than you can get from a single processor system to keep up with and utilise all of a GTX980 or Titan for rendering in most circumstances.
 
Armageus said:
80% of the difference would be from upgrading the Quadro though - 192 cuda cores vs 2048 of the 980!



:confused: But you could have just fitted a 980 to the previous one - if the GPU provides so much speedup by having more cuda cores, then I doubt you are cpu limited.
Click to expand...

Nah man. Spoke to 2 different specialists about this. Matching a 980 with a xeon wasn't recommended due to the architecture of the existing Dell.
Dell then said they wouldn't sell me xeon 6-core, with EEC ram and a consumer gftx 980.
The 6-core and extra ram is actually what has made the biggest difference to our guys so far. When we hit bigger renders using vray etc then cuda will really come into it.
 
Cyanide said:
Unless the work is critical (medical, architectural etc) then a consumer card will have an awful lot more power per £ than a professional workstation card. The workstation cards have more stable drivers and have better error correction so are better suited for very high precision work. If it's 3d rendering, animation, video editing etc then a consumer card should be fine and a lot cheaper.

No need to go all out on the top end gpu either unless you're running a seriously high end system - http://ppbm7.com/index.php/tweakers-page/83-balanced-systems/94-balanced-systems
Click to expand...

This ^^^
 
If dell refuse to sell the system you want then build your own. If you can write the cost off as a business expense then id go for a high end Quadro. if its from your own pocket then id go for a 980ti or a Titan.
 
Just thinking about thr above couple threads.
Is there any significant advantage for Cuda over OpenCL assuming all other parts identical?
I just thought initially that Cuda was Nvidia naming and AMD simply used the more generic OpenCL name?

Software we are using seem to use either.
 
Cuda is just an nvidia specific version of opencl, there's a few renderers that are cuda only. I assume Cuda sdk makes development easier or else it wouldn't make sense to write cuda only software when opencl would run on nvidia AND amd.
 
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