My motherboard doesn’t have the space to fit 4 double-width gpu’s, so I’m considering using the final (single) slot for display / viewport activity only (in 3DS Max etc).
(so, this new 4th card won’t be assisting in any of the GPU rendering, I’ll leave that to my 3 x 1080 ti’s).
So… the question is, as per the title, a single slot GPU recommendation that’ll give me best FPS performance in 3DS Max - I wouldn’t discount a Quadro, if one exists as a single slot (if I can be convinced it’d be worth it as my experience is, they aren’t).
My scenes can be literally any size, from 500,000 polys to around 25 million polys.
I like the idea of trying a Quadro card because I find with the 1080ti’s I have that the viewport quality isn’t particularly great - at times geometry looks faulty until I zoom closer and then the issue disappears.
So I’d like to think by paying for a ‘pro’ card, those kinds of issues would melt away…
That’s true for 3ds max and probably all other DCC apps. But for CAD/CAM software the situation is very different and quadros usually perform much better.
I have issues in 3DS Max where objects are sometimes displayed annoyingly crudely, for example, very jagged edges, and the number of times I’ve thought I had duplicate/coplanar faces has had me wasting time questioning this and zooming in closer to find out that there aren’t and that it is a display issue.
Also, others have also commented that there is a delay before arc/rotating around a viewport and zooming - at first I thought it was just me and I just got used to it, until someone else mentioned that this happens for the GTX cards like mine and not for Quadros.
It’s ‘little’ things like these, as well as the fact that I ‘need’ a single slot solution to leave the other cards in my system free for GPU rendering that is making me consider the P4000.
objects are sometimes displayed annoyingly crudely
This happens with very large scenes, typically, and usually only in perspective viewports. I have no idea if Quadros help with this.
Hi Jez, I’m personally very interested in the viewport differences between GTX and Quadro. I remember 4/5 years ago that using a quadro (with the max Nvidia certified drivers) gave a boost in fps performance, especially when viewing wireframe. Although the difference only became really apparent when the vertex count became very large (plus the quadros seemed not as responsive when viewport was set to shaded). My best guess was this was when using openGL- not DirectX which I think is always recommend over openGL now. Not sure how the certified drivers work performance wise with DirectX. There is very little info directly comparing quadro and GeForce in max - you can’t really compare between different versions, as some viewport problems are bugs in Max and vary between version (i.e. happen with both quadro and geforce). Wouldn’t worry about the so call reliabliy with quadro as a buying choice - although 10bit colour is good (although, not sure max would take advantage, photoshop does though) if you have a high end monitor and calibration (no colour banding with graduations). If you do get a quadro, I would be very grateful if you performed some tests and posted ! All the best Ben
Thanks Jez, hadn’t seen that. I’ve not used Maya much but would guess the performance comparison between GeForce & Quadro translates quite well to Max.
Personally, I use GeForce, but that was due to being bitterly disappointed when I used a quadro with sketchup - the quadro would navigate through the same scene at half the speed of the cheaper (but equivalent) GeForce.
Me too, I use GeForce 1080ti’s and to be honest I’m currently getting good results with my current project so maybe the newer drivers these days from NVIDIA are fixing the issues I had mentioned previously.
Whenever I’ve spoken with chaosgroup they’ve recommended to have a dedicated card for display purposes enough times for me to take notice.
My original plan was always to have 4 x 1080 ti s but I now know I’d be squashing some of my mobo cables using the forth bottom-most slot if I did that (I’ve tried) so I think it makes sense to play safe and go with a single slot Quadro dedicated for display.
I’m tempted to get a p4000 off Amazon and try before I buy, if it disappoints I can always return it (not something I’ve ever done before tbh).
Great idea Jez :). Do let us all know how you get on. I bet it’s the usb3 header cables that make it difficult to use that last slot! There are some right-angle adapters you can use to re-route it out of the way.
Yeah, I have got those right-angle connectors, but it’s also the fan header as well as the audio connector (I think, can’t see tbh). I could squash it in there, but the prices of 1080 ti’s and a P4000 are pretty close, so it’ll be interesting what my findings on a P4000 will be. For sure if / when I get one, I’ll report back and ask what specific tests to run etc.
! All the best Ben