Solidworks System and Video Card?

[noz]

Does anyone know if a Quadro FX or ATI Fire card will work with an HP Elite m9600t (Intel i7) or m9500z (this comes with an AMD chip)?

Honestly I don't know why the Workstations are so expensive other than because they come with the expensive video cards. In every other way, they are inferior to gaming systems in terms of memory, etc.

Any ideas? Suggestions? Comments?

 

[photonboy]

Open it up and see if you have a spare slot. You likely have a spare PCIex16 slot and are using onboard video currently.

Cards are compatible based solely on their interface. PCIe is really all there is. AGP is the older standard.

The other issue is the power supply. It has to supply enough power, enough current and have the proper connector(s) if needed. Connector adapters (4-pin molex to 6 or 8-pin) can be found easily.

If the max power of the card is 100W then a generic 400W should be good enough.

That's as good an answer as I can give.

I'm wondering how your programs would work with the ATI HD4770 or a newer NVidia card. Traditional gaming cards are evolving and will push out workstation cards eventually. Some programs already take advantage of these new cards so you may wish to inquire into this.

 

[noz]

Thanks for the reply.

Unfortunately I don't have physical access to one. I was hoping someone was familiar with the system and knew if the motherboard in those units can accommodate such a video card.

The problem with the gaming cards is that they are not as efficient in crunching numbers realtime as the dedicated CAD/engineering cards. I've read that while they are fast, they are driven towards handling already available textures...where as a CAD card does renderings and modifications to graphics real time.

Here is the card I want to put into the HP system:

http://www.nvidia.com/object/product_quadro_fx_1800_us.html

And here is the HP system.

http://www.shopping.hp.com/webapp/shopping/computer_can_series.do?storeName=computer_store&category=desktops&a1=Category&v1=Performance+and+entertainment&series_name=m9600t_series

Cheers
Noz

 

[noz]

Anyone else?