Planning new PC system - requirements?

[DanEpps]

Before i get an indignant reply to my previous post please refer to this link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nvidia_Quadro

<indignant reply>
Check the wiki article closely (highlighted areas) and you will see what I'm talking about Nick. A gaming card will never perform as well as a technical card in a technical application.

One thing to keep in mind about wiki articles is that they are NOT definitive sources of information as they can be edited by ANYONE.
</indignant reply>

By the way, just kidding with the <indignant reply> tags.

quadro.jpg (54.67 KiB) Viewed 7712 times

[Nick M Singer]

Come on Dan that is not the only source I can cite, at least be gentlemanly enough to admit they do use the same processors in the Quadro and GeForce cards as clearly outlined in the schedule. However this is all academic as what counts is user experience and I am stating categorically that for me there is no difference between the 2 cards I mentioned when running eCabs.... except the price. Others may feel differently however but a stopwatch does not lie.

[DanEpps]

Come on Dan that is not the only source I can cite, at least be gentlemanly enough to admit they do use the same processors in the Quadro and GeForce cards as clearly outlined in the schedule. However this is all academic as what counts is user experience and I am stating categorically that for me there is no difference between the 2 cards I mentioned when running eCabs.... except the price. Others may feel differently however but a stopwatch does not lie.

<gentleman=on>
Okay, I agree that they appear to be using the same chip. The biggie is the firmware though. This is really where all of any chip's capabilities come from. Without firmware a chip is about as good as a handful of sand and the driver cannot communicate with it.

You are correct though in that whatever the user is happy with is what counts.

Now, head down to Clifton 4th...it'll take your mind off of this.

[Kerry Fullington]

Nick,

Download This Job and take it for a spin. Literally, how does it rotate, is it smooth or jerky? How fast does it render in presentation view?

Kerry

[Gary Puckett]

Just remember no matter what you buy or how new it is remember BACK UP, BACK UP, BACK UP as you probably read in one of my post my computer crashed and I lost everthing.

My wife got a new laptop and in 48 days it crashed. I think it cost about 1,500-2,000 to retrieve your information

Gary

[Rick Palechuk]

Kerry, I don't think a rendering like this should be considered for any kind of benchmarking. Sure you can draw anything in E-cabs, but in the real world, is it practical? There is a lot of other programs out there that specialize in creating drawings of that nature. So the question is, What do the majority of E-cabers use the program for?

[Kerry Fullington]

Rick,

The point is that there is a differnce in the gaming cards and the workstation class cards. It is not correct to tell people that there is no difference and that they don't need a top notch card because some of them will. It all depends on how much detail you get into. Many of my jobs won't run on a lesser card. They barely run on the quadro card. Dean used this job when he was working on his Quadro Tweak to test different cards so I felt that it was a type of benchmark.


Kerry

[Damon Nabors]

Well, Once you get past all the, "He said, She said", stuff. It will come down to your personal budget for a new computer. It is kind of like buying a Thermwood class router-VS-maybe "Brand X". I don't guess there is anything wrong with Brand-X They are both routers but they may not perform the same. The suggested system requirements have been posted, so if you lean another direction, be prepared when the system doesn't act as it should. In the even that you have all the required system requirement and then you have a problem, start complaining. I have a great computer and it does not meet the specs posted, but it will do the type of work I need to get out of my shop. When the time comes that I have out grown the computers capabilities, then it will be time to re-evaluate the needs of my computer.

Most of the discussion here has turned into a battle of who is more technically minded. I personally don't understand how to translate all the technical specifications and I am sure there are a lot of others that do not either. That is why I fear that some will go out and spend a ton of money on a computer that may not perform as they would like simply because someone here as said it will not make any difference. If you are doing simple renderings with not a lot of bells and whistles thrown in there, you will probably be just fine. And then there are others like Kerry that requires all the bells and whistles. When it comes down to it, buy as much computer as the budget will allow.

[Kerry Fullington]

Damon,

The sad thing is that I have two computers in the office that were purchased just for eCabinets about three years ago that met the specs then but are pretty much useless as far as eCabinets goes now. Both of them are because the graphics cards are now sub standard. The desktop I could fix (not worth the money) but the laptop of course I can't.

Kerry

[Damon Nabors]

Kerry,

I can feel your pain. I have a really nice work station that is eat up with the Virus, USELESS. I have spent hundreds of dollars on software to get rid of the virus but it just will not go away. My teenage son found all kinds of nice stuff to look at on the Internet that was supposed to be blocked and screwed up a really nice computer. It amazes me the crap on the internet these days. I was looking at the classified ads on craigslist the other day and you would be amazed what you can find on there for sale. Now I am starting to notice that my laptop performance is starting to diminish. It still gets the job done, but seems to lock up more than usual. I guess I will have to cut out a new computer on the Router.

[Nick M Singer]

Sorry Kerry I am down at the beach so I cant test that monster "Stage" file of yours right now. Dan, when last were you on 4th?

[DanEpps]

Sorry Kerry I am down at the beach so I cant test that monster "Stage" file of yours right now. Dan, when last were you on 4th?

Never...I just saw it on a show about the 10 best beaches in the world. From what I understand though, locals prefer either the 1st or 2nd over the 4th because the 4th is way too crowded with tourists.

[Nick M Singer]

Yes I know the crowding is terrible all those topless girls get in the way of the view. Kerry I have seen this file before and as last time there seems to be something wrong with it. It struggles to load, and brings my system to a grinding halt. I have files twice the size that open and manipulate just fine.

[Kerry Fullington]

Nick,

There is nothing wrong with the file. That is why that file is a good test of a graphics card. It is not the size of the file, it is what is in it. Because of part editor cuts this really puts a strain on the graphics card. The workstation class cards can manipulate it. Dean's Quadro Tweak improved the performance greatly. My point is, there is a reason the eCabinets guys recommend the quadro cards.

Now this all being said, if the other cards work for what you are doing there is no reason to upgrade, but you have to be careful when you tell someone else there is no difference. They may need the enhanced performance of the workstation card and be very dissapointed with a gaming card.

Kerry

[Dean Fehribach]

<<snip>>Now this all being said, if the other cards work for what you are doing there is no reason to upgrade, but you have to be careful when you tell someone else there is no difference. They may need the enhanced performance of the workstation card and be very dissapointed with a gaming card.<<snip>>

I've been sitting back watching this and have finally decided to give my input.

Kerry is right.

What I've said in the past still holds true: "Your mileage may vary." We here at eCabinet Systems must advise our customers what we recommend as well as the minimum specification. If one does only cabinet boxes, doesn't use moldings, doesn't do glass, and doesn't add complex hardware like Classic Brass' lion's head knob then a GeForce card will work well. But we recommend the Quadro FX cards because they perform very, very well when using these complex objects. Even the provided link supports this fact. In their testing, the Quadro Firmware and Drivers improved graphics performance significantly. If an "enthusiast" chooses to push his hardware, there are many, many ways to push the hardware beyond its retail configuration. Even Intel and IBM "clock-down" their processors and lower the price then enthusiasts will "overclock" them to boost performance.

Heck, in their servers, IBM may dumb down a dual-core processor so that it only runs one core. If a customer later wants more power, an update can be applied to the hardware to enable the second core. Is IBM ripping off its customers by selling them a dual-core processor by allowing only one core to be used? Absolutely not. IBM makes one chip, reduces the price in an entry-level server, and makes up the cost reduction if the customer needs the upgrade. In this way, IBM needs to only manufacture and market one PowerPC processor for many lines of servers, reducing manufacturing costs and helping to keep retail pricing lower. This may in fact be the same principle implemented by nVidia. Is nVidia ripping everyone off? Absolutely not.

In the past, when customers have phoned in concerning the price of the Quadro FX cards, I've recommended they wade into it by purchasing the Quadro FX 570/580/590 series of cards (<$200) because they offer great performance with our nVidia tweak. The negative is these cards may have only 128MB of onboard memory, but our developers note that 128 is a good entry point.

BTW, I don't use a stopwatch to gauge performance improvements. I use a special OpenGL utility provided by the 3D engine developer that counts the frame rate when comparing cards.