Graphic card advice needed

[BBB3]

Hi guys,

I've been having huge graphic card driver problems lately, which are forcing me to work in Max with OpenGL for the time being. I'm talking to Nvidia about this but it got me thinking of buying a new card, given that I wasn't at all happy with my low-end Quadro 380 to start with.

Since I need Physx support for simulations, lots of memory for large textures, a fast viewport, and the possibility to do GPU rendering at some stage, some friends recommended the GeForce GTX 285. In fact, Oleg at Orbaz told me Physx was working better on consumer than on pro cards.

The card looks great on paper, but my vendor is advising me against putting a consumer card in a CAD workstation, even though it's basically compatible. He says he doesn't want to be held responsible if Max or Mudbox stop working.

I've used Max with a GeForce before and it worked fine, despite some occasional weirdness in the viewport. And I'm reluctant to pay the extortionate fee PNY is asking for a high-end Quadro. Does anyone have any experience they could share? I'm running Max 2010 on Vista 64bits. My rig is a dual Xeon Quad.

Cheers

[Neilg]

Everyone I know of doing max related stuff (2 full offices and a bunch of students) uses consumer cards these days. They wont be able to help you if it breaks, but they make it sound like max is going to kill the video card within hours to scare you - it wont, most likley it'll run perfect for years.

[BBB3]

Thanks, that's reassuring.

The support issue matters to me. But it's not like I'm getting much support at all from my driver problem from either Nvidia, my vendor or my manufacturer. That experience basically killed the support argument for Quadros for me.

[Olli96]

He says he doesn't want to be held responsible if Max or Mudbox stop working.

Sounds like the guy is trying to get some extra bucks out of you. A graphic card wont do anything to your installed software. Go with a decent consumer card, like cubiclegangster i work most of the time on a "gamer card" and most of the people i know too. A friend recently bought a fire gl and guess what, the 2% speed you get more of a pro card is barely visible and he is quite pi**ed that he was spending a lot of money.

[BBB3]

Thanks Olli (and hi from a fellow Berliner).

Yes, that possibility (extra buck) did cross my mind.

I think I'll jump ships and go for the gamer option. Just need to make sure the GTX 285 fits in my case first (my vendor told me the 295 would be too long).

[werticus]

quatro's are a load of crap.

I see lots and lots of people on this forum with mid level and entry level quatro's that cost more than the high end gamer cards and i *face palm*.

Unless you can afford the best of the best quatro, or you NEED the multi monitor syncing or some other high end feature that 99% of people on this forum DO NOT NEED, then buying the high end gamer card will get you better performance.

Just be careful you buy the single chip solution as max does not support SLI or xfire.

The 285 is the pick for sure, since you need physx.

[werticus]

http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/20...-edition.ars/1

[BBB3]

Thanks Werticus. That's hilarious.

So there really isn't any ground to stay with the Quadro.

[Morbid Angel]

quatro's are a load of crap.

I couldn't agree more. Any time I worked on quadros, albeit 1300 or 4600 they had extremely buggy performance. Nothing that would justify paying the kind of money they cost. I would go with geforce 260 or some form of that.

[beestee]

I would go with geforce 260 or some form of that.

GTX 260s are great, but I would add that you want to avoid any factory overclocked iterations. As lucrative as the higher core clock may seem, they are typically more trouble than they are worth. Not sure about the Physx support on the 260s though.

[BBB3]

Thanks for all the support, guys.
My idea is to go for the 285 (I think the 295 is physically too big). I've read of a lot of sensible improvements done by Nvidia between the 260 and 285, which seems to be a more mature product. I was going to stay clear of overclocked products as I don't want to overtax my system too much either. I think stability is key. Again, thanks for all the useful pointers. I'm definitely ditching the Quadro.
B

[BBB3]

Thanks again guys.
I've now bought and installed the 285, only to find out my PSU is 50w below the minimum recommended by Nvidia. So I'm going to tread carefully until I can install a brand new, bigger PSU. I'm not looking forward to the re-wiring
Having said that, the card works great and everything seems to be running fine and fast. Physx is a dream with such a card!