What card is best for REAL graphics work?

[enewmen]

I am not a good 3-D artist, but I know 3D was around LONG before games. I think GL Quake was the first REAL 3D game (about 1999?)

Anyway, So, what is the best high performance NON professional card out there for all apps except for games? (no Fire GL, etc)

Just asking because of so much talk about game FPS. But what about all other apps?
Very likely, the best game card is also best at wireframe, 3D studio, etc.

 

[RichPLS]

Two choices at the top. Go figure...

 

[bourgeoisdude]

As far as the best graphics capabilities, the Radeon x1900 is best for now. It is the fastest too, but for the time being it has the newest and best technology as well. I'd wait till the summer if possible as both nvidia and ati will likely release their next generation graphics cards (ATI x2000 series??? and GeForce 8 series)

 

[cleeve]

6600 GT.

Nvidia has excellent OpenGL drivers in their consumer cards, and this really helps CAD stuff like 3dsMAX.

The 6600 GT has very fast clockspeeds too, which CAD programs like.

 

[Anoobis]

I'm not sure what you mean by no FireGL. It's ATI's line of professional workstation graphics cards. The nVidia version would be the Quadro FX series of cards.

I don't know much about them except that they can be very, very expensive and are used for professional CAD and Animation graphics.

I think for the home amateur though, any of the good gaming cards are more than sufficient.

 

[cleeve]

He means he wants to know which non-pro card (NOT the FireGL or Quadro) is the best for PRO apps like 3dsMAX.

His assumption was the the best gaming card would also be the best CAD card, but that's not really true.

The best CAD cards *are* the best gaming cards, but re-branded as Quadros or FireGLs... but they are also tweaked so that they can use the pro drivers. The HARDWARE is the same, but the DRIVERS make the cards work better in CAD and not as well in games.

When you're paying all thet cash for a Quadro or FireGL, you're paying for the specialized drivers more than you're paying for the hardware itself.

In the past, you could mod a gaming card to be able to use pro drivers, thut that's been getting harder to do as time goes on. I don't think you can do it with the newest generation of cards, but I haven't looked into that lately.

Having said that, the best cheap card to use for gaming and CAD is the 6600 GT, as I said Nvidia's gaming OpenGL drivers are pretty darn stable in pro apps, and the 6600 GT has high clockspeeds which some pro apps will prefer, even over more pipelines.

Of course, the 7800 series is probably better in CAD but I don't know if it'd make all that much difference.

 

[Anoobis]

Thanks Cleeve. I was always a little curious about them, but never got around to looking into it. Thanks for clearing it up for me.

 

[enewmen]

Thanks guys for the strong response.
Explained a lot.

 

[enewmen]

TEST...

 

[ak47is1337]

get cards with massive amounts of memory. more memory = better image quality
so a 7800gtx 512/x1800's/1900's would work. not sure why you refuse to pick a quadro though..

 

[cardcrash]

Jeez, what does this thing do for all that money?!?

http://www.dabs.com/ProductView.aspx?Quicklinx=3Y6Y&CategorySelectedId=11137&PageMode=1&NavigationKey=11137,21

or this:

http://www.dabs.com/ProductView.aspx?Quicklinx=3JX4&CategorySelectedId=11137&PageMode=1&NavigationKey=11137,21

 

[Crashman]

Cleeve's right, look around at sysopt.com's features and find the 6600GT SLI review. 6600GT kicks butt in OGL, and kicks even bigger butts with SLI mode in OGL.