NVIDIA's Quadro FX 5800 with 4GB graphics memory is 'the most powerful graphics card in history'
By Thomas Ricker 
posted November 10th 2008 6:44AM
posted November 10th 2008 6:44AM
posted November 10th 2008 6:44AM
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Actually, it is addressable by the computer and does count towards the 4GB memory limit.
The only way your graphics memory affects your total system memory is if it is integrated. A dedicated card has its own memory and its own memory controller completely independent of your CPU memory address controller.
I can't believe you people low ranked me for telling the truth. So you guys either need to pick up a book and read, or stop playing games on your piss weak ass laptops with your integrated Intel G3100 and upgrade to a real PC.
How your CPU sees your GPU's memory and an explaination of how it is actually addressed.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IOMMU
As you can clearly read, the CPU's memory controller is for address RAM memory, the only memory it has direct access to besides its caches. THe IOMMU handles the device addressing.
I can has in my next computer build? :3
That thing has more on-board memory than my whole computer... Not to mention the card alone also costs almost 10 times more than it also.
Netbooks are not real computers...
Yes they are.
Oil and gas exploration? everybody knows that Exxon already knows where all the oil is, they are just sitting on it. They just buy cards like this to play Unreal Tournament while the money rolls in.
No.
We are not doing this.
4gb!!! IMBA... bet it could run mario all by itself. LOL
In the end, all of it will end up somewhere in China. e-waste.
wow, emo much?
Should help with Open CL and exponentially increase video encoding performance.
The 4GB of RAM wouldn't do anything at all in terms of gaming performance, even if this was a gaming oriented card. Games today don't need 4GB of RAM, there's no way that you will need to buffer that much data with the current state of in-game graphics.
This is a professional card, and nVidia is doing a good job of getting a lot of PR with it. Saying they have the fastest card (even if it's only a professional card) piques the interest of gamers and enthusiasts, even though there's no way that it would be useful or practical for gaming.
i hope they know to have a 64 bit OS lulz.
"the most powerful graphics card in history"
Don't you mean for the next 4 months?
And by the next 4 months they'll have a new one.
Yeah, but how many frame rates can you get with the highest video settings on in Crysis?
We've seen this joke 3 or 4 times in this one article.
1 framerate per monitor. Do you mean what frame rate?
psh my 4mb Geforce 2 Go could give this fat s.o.b. a lickin'
-___- *sigh* i wanna get atleast 1 for my graphic design!! but the money...better start saving up!!! =P
for all you people sayying how this card won't be the best for long, i wouldn't think like that...when nvidia says best, that means they aren't releasing anything better until someone releases a better car...that's where ati's fire pro 8700 (with a quarter of the ram XD) comes in!!
for the other stupid people who are asking questions about games, shutup and get a gtx280. the quadro is a workstation card meant for quality work that takes time!! it's high precision to make stuff like commercials and games that you gamers play. those car commercials are done with these kind of graphic cards, ON COMPUTER ONLY! (quite impressive actually =P) gaming card is just taking information and rendering them roughly. gaming cards are about fps of low quality 3d models and renderings... go look at an audi r8 commercial...that was ALL done with quadro workstation cards in a rendering farm...
It is a capital goods.
forgot to add, the ram on the graphic card has nothing to do with anything, but the gpu!! it's only the gpu that has direct connection. that ram is only for storing those calculations that make up the frames on your screen.
And textures, scenes, models, shaders, and the cup holder/cigarette lighter combo... and it'd still have room to eat my soul.
For the things this card is designed to be used for, that much vRAM might really be needed at times. But without a core/memory clock fast enough, that much vRAM could slow the memory operations and create a bottleneck. 102GB/s on 2GB is about twice as fast as 102GB/s on 4GB. Less stuff to access over the same bus. Wait, 102GB/s -> 4GB. Whoa...
Who still has a 32-bit OS? I didn't think people still used that?
Windows XP was the first Microsoft OS to have a 64bit version. I only mention MS because it is the mainstream. Linux, Apple and the derivatives have had 64bit OSes for many years past.
How did they run the Sparc64 then?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SPARC
A mate of mine had the thing for ages, running FreeBSD, way before AMD got serous with 64 bit.
Laughing Man - I have a Quadro FX 1700 512mb DDR2 I purchased recently for my Precision 370 box. My box has 4GB of ram installed with win2k3 32bit OS. Actual RAM identified 3.34 BEFORE installing the FX 1700. Installed it came out to 2.25 available. I did not know what it was at first. BIOS recognized my 4gb but the OS refused, so I took an old hard drive and built XP-32bit on it. Same results, 2.25gb. I removed the card and put in a basic PCI graphics card and voila, 3.34 available was back. I double checked the specs on nvidia website to ensure my card had its own 512mb which it does.
I am posting just my experience which leads me to believe in what RobertMfromLI states above.