Maya - 7900GT/X vs lower spec Quadro cards

[augiem]

Can anyone tell me which would run faster in Maya:

A new 7900GT/GTX or a QuadroFX 4000 / 3400 / FX1500

I do a lot of 3D work in Maya that requires a LOT of texturing, specifically building game levels. I'm upgrading to a Conroe E6600 system soon and I want to get a good card, but I have no idea the performance differences in Maya with a Quadro vs a gaming card.

I'm wondering if the raw speed of the 7900GT or GTX would trump the Quadro benefits on these two slower cards. Or even if someone can point me to a comparison of Quadros with gaming cards in Maya, I'd appreciate it. An older FX4000(softmod) or FX3400 / 3450 class card isn't out of my price range totally, and neither is the Quadro 1500 (slower, but newer GPU) but I'd really have to know it was worth it over the GTX to spend the $$$ (specifically in Maya).

Thanks,

Augie

 

[Me_cago_en_el_moderador]

In maya the fastest cards are the quadro x500 (geforce 7900 based). (1500,3500,4500,5500)
Quadro 1500 is a 7900GT with OpenGl optimizations and is faster than one 3400,3450/4000 (geforce 6800 based).

quadro 1500= faster than 7900 in maya and the same in gaming
quadro 4500= faster than 7900gtx in maya and the same in gaming
quadro 4500X2= 7950 gx2
quadro 5500 = 7900 gtx with 1Gb andpro caps

 

[TheGreatGrapeApe]

In Maya you will likely find the Cheapest 'CURRENT' Quadros outperform the Most expensive desktop/gaming cards, because of their DRIVERS.

The Quadros have optimized drivers, and that's what makes the difference, and it makes all the difference in the world allowing an essentially GF7300 class card to outperform a GX2.

Do a little reasearch and you'll find information on soft moding Geforces to Quadros, and IMO that will give you the best results. Straight up the X1800 and X1900 beat the GF7900 in Maya, but with the Optomized drivers then the Quadro beats the FireGL;
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/video/display/ati-firegl-v7350_8.html

It's been that way for a while.

I can't rememebr where I saw the recent pro app benches but they're out there if you're willing to look (but be ready to translate some German, French or Russian).

 

[augiem]

Thanks for replying guys!

quadro 1500= faster than 7900 in maya and the same in gaming

I found the specs on the Q1500 and it appears to be a clocked down/pipe disabled 7900GT.

QuadroFX 1500 = 375MHz core, 1250Mhz memory, 16 pixel, 6 vertex pipelines
Geforce 7900GT = 450/500MHz core, 1320MHz memory, 20pixel and ?? vertex pipelines

Do a little reasearch and you'll find information on soft moding Geforces to Quadros...
but with the Optomized drivers then the Quadro beats the FireGL;
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/video/display/ati-firegl-v7350_8.html

It appears the last card you could softquadro was the 6800 series. So SQ'd, that'd be a FX-4000 card, which is last generation. How that compares to 7900GT in maya, I have no idea.

I found another Xbit article on FireGL vs Quadro and they got TOTALLY different results... odd. The FireGL's were 2X as fast as Quadros. Contradictory with their own article you linked...

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/video/print/quadrofx-vs-firegl.html

 

[TheGreatGrapeApe]

Very interesting. What a difference a driver update makes.

I've found that usually the FireGLs were lagging, but it's been a while since I've seen a good update (workstation reviews are very VERY hard to come by Digit-Life, 3Dchips, and 3DCentre used to do many, but now do few).

That's very interesting.

Oh and for everyone else, sorry my link was to the 3DsMax stuff, Maya is the next page;
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/video/display/ati-firegl-v7350_9.html

OOPS!

 

[augiem]

Another twist to the story

http://www.3dprofessor.com/index_ektron.asp

Scroll down to the 24th May 2006 SPECviewperf® 9 section.
Quadro 4500 trounces the FireGL again in these Maya tests...

This review is from the same time period as the Xbit labs, but the Nvidia driver used is a slightly newer Beta. Of course, it's not the exact same benchmark.