I am looking at video cards and my understanding is this:  Editing high definition video relies more on processor and memory capabilities than it does dedicated graphics processing units.  Graphic rendering and texturing involved in 3-D (cad, etc.) programs are far more dependant on GPU(s).  And my question is, with Avid, is there a significant difference between the 8800 GT cards vs. the Quadro FX cards.  Specifically, I am looking at XFX GeForce 8800 ultra with 768 MB DDR3.  Shouldn't this card surpass the performance of the recommended Quadro 560 by miles?

bw7001:

Editing high definition video relies more on processor and memory capabilities than it does dedicated graphics processing units.

It depends on the type of project that you're editing.  Avid uses the GPU in effects rendering.  The display card is very important.

bw7001:

And my question is, with Avid, is there a significant difference between the 8800 GT cards vs. the Quadro FX cards.

To use the Avid supplied and approved display driver you require a Quadro card or at least a card that can be made to look like a Quadro card.  If you patch that card using Rivatuner you may be able to use it.  Until you try it you won't know.  So to quote Dirty Harry, "do you feel lucky?"  (Quote shortened in the interests of not starting fights).

MC 3 is still highly dependent on OpenGL. The difference between the FX and Quadro cards is OpenGL support (physically the cards are generally identical except for the firmware identifying the card model; this causes a different set of drivers to get loaded when the card is installed). The Quadro drivers turn on all of the hardware based OpenGL support on the card. The FX drivers only enable partial OpenGL hardware support.

As jwrl says, you can softmod a lot of NVidia (and ATI) desktop cards into their Workstation equivalents, in which case the workstation drivers get loaded. However, both NVidia and ATI have started locking the cards, preventing a softmod from working. I don't believe the 8800GT can be modded to a Quadro.

Note that if you use a high-end FX card it may still have enough stuff turned on to allow for full usage of MC and BCC (e.g.full screen display, etc.), but you won't know until you try. And some things may perform more slowly until you've got a Quadro no matter what.

so true i had an 6800 gt with my older avid 5.7 axp and rendering was a pain  

got a quadro fx3500 off ebay 200 bucks usd smooth sailing ever since

selling my 6800 cheep

Thanks for the speedy replies!

What do you think of using 2 nvidia quadro fx4400's (instead of 1 really expensive card) with this motherboard...

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=3523225&CatId=2050

Any experience with SLI boards?

Much appreciated!

Ben

tompearson:

so true i had an 6800 gt with my older avid 5.7 axp and rendering was a pain  

got a quadro fx3500 off ebay 200 bucks usd smooth sailing ever since

selling my 6800 cheep

Surely you could have 'modded' that 6800GT into a Quadro FX4000 That's exactly what I'm planning on doing.

So... that 6800GT... is that PCIe or AGP? How 'cheap' is 'cheap'???

Hard to say. While a number of users who've posted indicate that they have SLI configurations, I've not seen any performance benchmarks posted.

DStone:

............The difference between the FX and Quadro cards is OpenGL support ................. The Quadro drivers turn on all of the hardware based OpenGL support on the card. The FX drivers only enable partial OpenGL hardware support.........................Note that if you use a high-end FX card it may still have enough stuff turned on to allow for full usage of MC and BCC (e.g.full screen display, etc.), but you won't know until you try. And some things may perform more slowly until you've got a Quadro no matter what.

 Dave, Either I am reading this too early on Sunday morning... or you wrote it too late on Saturday.

Have you mixed up  FX / Quadro/ and GE.   I connect Quadro and FX as in "Quadro FX" and "GE" is the other group of NVidia cards.  I am not trying to be smart, but if you did make a mistake in the nomenclature it could be totally confusing for many readers of your otherwise useful post.

Regards,

Douglas

 as for the 6800  i was unaware of the soft modleing at the time  i was having trouble and the quadro was there and well the rest is history  and as we cannot sell on this forum e mail me and i will work somthing out for a fellow scot

 forgot agp

tompearson:

 as for the 6800  i was unaware of the soft modleing at the time  i was having trouble and the quadro was there and well the rest is history  and as we cannot sell on this forum e mail me and i will work somthing out for a fellow scot

No probs, didn't want to breach the terms of use in here either. You've got mail

I have a computer with an 8800GTX "softmodded" to a Quadro 4600. So far, no complaints from AVID...

drbgaijin:

Dave, Either I am reading this too early on Sunday morning... or you wrote it too late on Saturday.

I'm not sure what they call it in Japanese, but in English it's called "a mistake!" I meant GeForce when I wrote FX.

DStone:

drbgaijin:

Dave, Either I am reading this too early on Sunday morning... or you wrote it too late on Saturday.

I'm not sure what they call it in Japanese, but in English it's called "a mistake!" I meant GeForce when I wrote FX.

　　間違い  - You may have to change your browser "View" "encoding" to unicode or JIS to see that correctly. By the way it is read as "machigai"

Where else, but the Avid Forum, can you learn about MC and Japanese at the same time?

Regards,

Douglas

 SO... then how do I "softmod" my GeForce 9800M so MC can reconize it?  I hope I just have to look in the software config somewhere.  I really don't want to tear open a spankin' new laptop.