Quadro vs Radeon vs GFX

some software uses GPU as well.

but what do you do? you do 3d stuff or just using video editors? if just use video editors - buy geforce or radeon card

Neither 3d Modelling nor Gaming. Pure real time financial market number crunching. I will be introducing production and publication of video based financial market comments on a regular basis. Intention is to publish as a movie (flash?). I am on a double mind regarding upgrading CPU/GPU or leave the xeon workstation as such and go for an overclocked new build with i7 3930k. May be I could use the new build as a front end and take xeon as a node for rendering....Please see this tread, which I posted a few days ago.

http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/342932-13-updating-...

Thanks you Sunius and Janiashvili....

What is real time financial market number crunching?  

You get a streaming data tick-by-tick (example, stock market, foreign exchange)....plotting the streaming data as a graph, running c++ computations and running optimisation all in real time)....for all these work the current system shown by the thread link in my previous post is sufficient. It is a different ball game if I want to publish video as movies (may be as a flash for example)....

I see. Then you definitely have to upgrade the CPU first! What's your budget?

My reply disappeared suddenly...

I have not fixed any budget! I know that's not ideal...

I am debating between (a) an upgrade of CPU (or a dual CPU)-cum-GPU on the 3 1/2 years old HP xw8600 and (b) an OC new build. The HP workstation has a HP mobo on a 771 LGA socket for xeon x5450.

http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/342932-13-updating-...

The options are (1) upgrade, (2) an OC new build and (3) the OCed new build and use xw8600 and an i7 950 notebook as render farm nodes.

We have the Ivy Bridge releasing coming shortly....

Well, if you were to upgrade CPU, you'd have to upgrade Motherboard+RAM too. Then if you want, you could buy a PSU, Hard drive and case so it is a new build. Since you're not doing 3d modelling or gaming, you could easily use integrated graphics for now. The budget is still needed  .

I remember this apple work station for running final cut pro. Dual socket xeon processor based MB, 8 gb ram , professional monitor. And for the graphic part a mere geforce 7300gs. Hope u got my point.

I'm not sure this is what you are looking for, but the GTX 680 has a new NVENC video encoder system that promises to speed up video editing.
http://www.guru3d.com/article/geforce-gtx-680-review/6

matto, it works only in few applications, which generally nobody uses because they are pretty bad.

Thanks Matto and Sunius...

Sorry...is it the NVENC video encoder system that is bad...

Upgrade:

£300-£500 for a mobo
£150-£200 for cooler
£250 for a case
£1000 for a xeon processor
£700 upwards for a GPU..
£500 for DDR3 RAM

PLUS HDD, accessories...£3200 - £3500 for upgrades....why to spend so much money to upgrade? Leave that alone, use that money to get build a better OCked new build....22nm IVY bridge?

therefore a new build is better

WoW that's a nice budget.. My suggestions:

CPU: Intel Xeon X5650 x2 - £1437.60
Motherboard: Intel Shady Cove S5520HC - £343.62
Memory: Kingston HyperX Genesis 24GB x2 - £239.98
Case: Cooler Master HAF X - £139.99
CPU cooler: Noctua NH-D14 x2 - £145,96
Graphics card: PNY NVIDIA Quadro 2000 - £673.32

Total: £2980,47 before hard drive, and I think you should choose it yourself, since I've no idea how much storage you need  

Thanks for the idea....

A dual xeon CPU gets a scores of 15530+, while a single i7 3730K gets 13500 plus. It can be easily overclocked to a stable 4.5 - 4.7 GHz GHz at a third of the cost of a dual XEON....we not only have a bang for the buck but would also easily beat the xeon in performance, is it not? It is almost a £1000 saving.

I am not sure if the dual xeon would give a significant performance advantage over the OCked i7 3930K. I am going to do some research on this in Google.

From my experience of running the xw8600, it runs almost 24 x 7 with a Saturday night shut down without any problem in the last 3 1/2 years....Touch wood.

Would the i7 3930K machine run on the same schedule? (I know that Noctua coolers are the best in the market. It should help).

I need almost 24x7 (at least 24x5 with a day time use on week ends) as our markets work around the clock from Monday to Friday!

Yea I wasn't really sure about xeons performance, but since you said you wanted one, I suggested it. Sure, i7 3930K will work 24/7 easily, and I wasn't aware it's so good in performance. You'll need RAM and Motherboard too then:

Motherboard: Asus P9X79 DELUXE - £289.98 (recommended by Tom's)
Memory:
if you want 64 GB:
G.Skill G.Skill RipJawsZ 32GB 2133MHz x2 - £503.98
if you want 32 GB:
Kingston HyperX Genesis 16GB 2133 MHz x2 - £263.98

professional processors beats their consumer counter parts in productive works. There are many reviews on the net. Even toms hardware have few of them. here is a link to latest one http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/xeon-e5-2687w-bench... You really dont a need professional cards for video compositing. What u need good processor, solid work station mother board and professional rams. These type of works need a system which is stable even after long run. Consumer products many have more raw power but r not made for long run. Intel also sells cabinets with smps included for workstation. Just google search.

If number crunching is the goal, I suggest none of the above and going with an nVidia Tesla solution, using CUDA cores.

It's supported in these applications, I don't know if you use any of them however:

SciComp: derivatives pricing
Hanweck: options pricing
Exegy: Risk Analysis
Aqumin: 3D Visualization of market data
Level 3 Finance
OnEye (Australia): Accelerated Trading Solutions
Arbitragis Trading
Enabling GPU Computing in the R Statistical Environment

The objectives are number crunching and video editing/composition/rendering.

Thanks for help.... Enjoyed reading Tom's review of motherboards...

Asus x79 looks interesting...What makes the WS tick over the Deluxe version (WS is out of stock in a few places in the UK)? Both seem a little power inefficient...Is it a better choice than Asus extreme IV or maximus V Gene? I thought I came across a workstation grade Asus motherboard with similar features....

http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/p9x79-deluxe-g1-assassin2...

http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/x79-ud3-p9x79-pro-dx79si-...

http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/x79-extreme4-dx79to-p9x79...

http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/rampage-iv-extreme-x79-ft...

At the moment, I am leaning towards GFX 680 than Quadro 4000. I will do some research on Tesla recommended by SK1939.

Wow...Tesla c2050 is £2000 plus....that's straight away out of the window....

Hehe yea he didn't quite looked at your budget. Don't get GTX 680 if you're not gaming, they nerfed computational power of it by quite a lot, just to make people like you buy quadros, since they perform way way way better than GTX series for professional applications.

So, your recommendation is to buy nVidia Quadros?

I see a lot of discussions on the forum both for and against between GFX and Quadros. I agree GFX is designed for gaming (fast, action, rendering), while Quadro (say 4000) is more for professional end. But, but some experienced video guys say they are old cards, while GFX have really come off age therefore quadro (4000) does not offer any signinficant benefit over 680!



It is a naive question: please explain the quote.

http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/geforce-gtx-680-review-be...

It's not really known why, but GTX 680 performs really poor when compared to other cards in computing. Even GTX 580 is way better!

Think Nvidia is trying to separate consumer products from professional one. Maybe the r trying slim up their fat cards a bit.  

There is a discussion on the adobe forum regarding this reckoning GTX 680 is probably deliberately downgraded in performance in this area....

http://forums.adobe.com/message/4302689...I am generating a benchmark comparison, which I would post after compilation...

Sorry guys,

I am afraid I am not able to attach the image (from my pc) of the comparison benchmark....

Thanks for the heads up...I read that review. It is computational performance is shocking...

Anandtech has a good discussion of the reduced compute capabilities of the GTX 680:
http://www.anandtech.com/show/5699/nvidia-geforce-gtx-6...

thanks I will read that....

Is there a review/comparison of quadros with radeon for video editing/rendering plus number crunching....?

Not really, since AMD has not really made advances in that area, at least not like nVidia has.

so, it really boils down to Quadros for my work type or try my luck with GTX 680 (that's one hell of a poor show on computing area).....the difference is 300 quid between quadro 4000 and gtx 680. I cannot afford higher end quadros (5000 upwards).....

I am of course very well aware CPU power and RAM are more important than GPU, unless GPU rendering route is taken.

thanks.

A GTX 580 has tons of compute power compared to the 680.

However, the 7970 blows it away. The only thing is it doesn't have CUDA, so any number crunching needs to use OpenCL or Direct Compute.

I'm already over my head here so I'll step out. Just something to consider.

Yes. A lack of CUDA is the problem. thanks any away.

The following link came to my attention on Google. It is an interesting artile/review on video card performance and unlocking all nVidia cards....please let me know how you got on...

http://www.studio1productions.com/Articles/PremiereCS5....

Just do us all a favor and don't attempt to flash, say a GTX 470, to create a hacked Quadro card. It won't work, and if it does, it will be highly unstable.

It is an interesting article; it might be of interest to some who may be interested in reading it. The post is not an attempt Period. If you do not like links of this, it is fair enough; I appreciate that but you do not have to react like this. Nevertheless, your cautioning is a good warning of the risks involved in fiddling with settings.

Thanks every one for the help. I am still a little undecided between Quadro 4000 or plugin the best of both worlds. Appreciate all helpful and valuable inputs and comments. Cheers

LOL! Really?  
Maybe not in your little space.  
There's more than just that out there, Sony Vegas supported AMD in 10, and then OpenCL in 11, and in a level playing field of OpenCL things are very different than in the closed CUDA world.

And if you're Buying/Building TODAY, then that is not the area you want to focus on, you want the future standards, which ain't CUDA-only.  



No, a Lack of CUDA isn't the problem, CUDA is the problem, OpenCL is the fix. The biggest problem is the amount of time wasted because of the CUDA distraction.

Definitely get a good and powerful gaming card, but don't worry about CUDA on the video side, it doesn't matter anymore compared to the open platforms as well as customized software for dedicated hardware, see intel HD4000 performance for transcode in MediaEspresso (is that a powerful GPU or GPGPU? H3LLZ Noes !!) then compare any nV card and then a slower ATi card (without fix), and then compare any of those to the BEST nV card using BadaBoom [nV's CUDA based transcoder] and you will see how laughable it is to worry about CUDA for a forward-looking/future build.

So don't limit yourself to just one vendor because of something as silly as a dead platform. AMD has good capable cards as does nVidia. Depending on the Application you use, or plan to use there are better performing solutions. However, getting a weaker OpenCL card for CUDA alone would be ridiculous at this point in time, unless you plan on building for for the last 3 years' software and not new software. You're probably still looking at a GTX570 being a power-house bang for buck, but the main thing is check the support and upcoming support for OpenCL and Direct Compute for that App, because even the old CUDA apps are now moving away from there and towards more universal solutions, that also scale far better. So while an nVidia card may very well be the best solution, it very well might not be, or might not be for long (as is the case with alot of apps recently   )

And don't waste your money on older Quadros, especially NOT a Crappy 2000 . There's little reason to go Quadro, and lotsa dollar reasons not to (spend those on faster CPUs or More RAM or faster/bigger SSDs)... unless you need the dedicated 3D Modeling supported drivers for specific apps (primarily for older versions of software too), and those can be soft-moded, speaking of which...



He wasn't (nor was the article mentioning) Flashing anything! Nor do you need to to Soft-Quadro either.  
The article is refering to the arbitrarily supported card list in Adobe CS 5.x in order to enable the Mercury Engine. There's long standing hacks to enable this on non-listed cards that is stable and just enables the features already in hardware.

Seriously, stop giving out information, you're really wasting other people's time and money.  

Wow, the more things change.. the more the info here stays the same.  

Best answer selected by SSri.