NVIDIA revs up pro graphics lineup
By Nilay Patel 
posted March 30th 2009 10:44AM
posted March 30th 2009 10:44AM
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posted March 30th 2009 10:44AM
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4GB Holy God that is a lot of memory on a video card.
Man! I remember playing good ol' Resident Evil on my separate VooDoo with about 512KB, was it? Or 1Meg? Still, 4GB GDDR is more than most users have RAM! :D
But I've been anxiously waiting for the 3800! Finally!
Wonder if these are the NVIDIA cards that the On Live guys were talking about. They mentioned that they have been working with NVIDIA when designing the servers. Makes sense as they also mentioned that Lego Batman and others like it were actually being ran via virtualization.
And none of them available on a Mac Pro. A workstation without workstation graphics. So much fail.
It´s always fascinating that these 3k+ $ machines come with a graphics card that´s only worth about 100 bucks. :D
They may receive them yet...well, eventually that is...about a year later, well after Windows based PC's have moved on to the next generation of cards.
Mac Pro's are anything but "pro", they are always playing catch up to PC's, perpetually late to the hardware game, and still offer fewer choices and less robust choices than PC's when it comes to 3D rendering capabilities and software.
Proud Troll
Really, Hamidxa? If Mac Pros are always behind, then maybe you can explain how they're using Xeon 5500s, a processor you can't even BUY for PCs yet. No really, please explain it to us, I'm sure your "explanation" will be scintillating.
And while you're at it, please explain how Mac Pros are at all behind the curve while using these processors to do work. I mean I'm sure you've heard of Photoshop, does that require a Quadro card to use? No? How about video editing, hmm? Sound recording? Page layout? Design? Illustration? Capture? Any one of another couple hundred things that one might use a Mac Pro for in a professional sense?
Perpetually late to the hardware game... by using new processors from Intel before anybody else can even buy them. That's an interesting definition of "late" you have going there.
Yeah he used to troll autoblog a lot too.
Mac Pro is supposed to be a workstation. There's no workstation level graphics available for it. Ergo, it is not quite a workstation until it has workstation level graphics.
"a processor you can't even BUY for PCs yet"
Afraid he's correct... well. Kinda. I think they were JUST out today for the other markets, so yeah.
Zak,which
The first processor released with the Nehalem architecture came in the flavor of the desktop Core i7, for the PC, which was released approximately 5 months ago, well before you could purchase them for any Mac based computer.
The Mac Pro's use i7 Nehalem's as well, Xeon based ones that are no faster than the i7 flavors that can be purchased from any one of a few hundred online vendors of our choice, without the ridiculous Apple Tax.
Secondly. the Mac "Pro" would imply that it offers Pro level hardware.
Funny that, I was not aware that Pro level hardware is relegated to 2D level software.
Really, is this how sad and pathetic you Mac folk have become? You have to limit the discussion of Pro hardware to 2D now?
And Photoshop, really?
Your version of Photoshop doesn't even support 64 bit processors/processes, the PC version does.
Neither does your version of Maya while we are on the subject of 64 bit design software.
So, while your chugging away on your Lightwave (without the numerous plugins), Maya (without the 64 bit), XSI (oops you don't have that), 3DSMax (oops again), AutoCad 3D (sorry, forgot again), I'll still be plugging away at that, at full speed, with updated hardware, and also destroy your performance when it comes to Photshop, Illustrator, Premiere, the whole gambit.
@ ZAK
No, professional graphic software does not need Quadro to run, but they sure will run faster if a "professional" system have them.
http://www.photoshopsupport.com/photoshop-blog/08/10-cs4/nvidia-quadro-photoshop-cs4-gpu-card.html
I work in the 3D industry and I got to have a quadro GPU.
@Hamidxa
I very seriously doubt that desktop i7 is faster than a Xeon otherwise no one would be buying the Xeon models for workstations and Apple is hardly the only game in town that is using them.
With respect to Photoshop it is worthwhile noting that the Windows version lacks 16-bit printing even in the CS4 edition. Whether that is important to you depends on whether you print but it is worth noting that the Mac version of Lightroom combines 64-bit processing and 16-bit printing. This said, I'm an Aperture man myself...
You are, however, correct about the rest. As with Adobe we are rather waiting for Autodesk and the rest to port their applications to Cocoa, which undoubtably will happen. Frankly, Apple should have been much clearer to developers that Carbon was going to be deprecated.
@zak
we will see how ahead of the curve apple is when in 6 months faster chips are out and there is no way to swap them into your brand 'new' computer
Kelmon,
The i7 Extreme Edition 965 Nehalem 3.2GHz processor will most certainly give the 2.66 (or even the 2.93) GHz i7 Xeon Nehalems in the Mac Pro a run for their money.
Also, as with most custom-built PC's, we have the luxury of overclocking, and these i7's overclock impeccably well.
For example, I have my i7 920 Nehalem 2.66 GHz running at 4.1 GHz right now.
All of this on a water-cooled system, although a buddy of mine has his running at 3.8 on a air-based heatsink/fan setup (believe it's a Thermalright U120).
Case in point, I guarantee you either of our setups will run circles around any Mac Pro when it comes to pure processing power and 2D calculations.
In 3D, PC's win by a land slide, it's no contest.
And yes, Mac's always play catchup, because even though the Xeon Nehalems are out now, your pickings are few and far in between.
They will be out for the PC within a few months anyhow, and then you play the waiting game again...another 18 months for the Mac lineup to refresh while during that time the PC has already leap frogged it many fold -- be it 2D or 3D.
NVIDIA is a company I used to own stock in until recently and I have used and liked their products for a long time, however I think the tide is turning against them. Intel does look to be poised to begin a takeover, and they are losing out on being included in upcoming game consoles and other systems. To me NVIDIA is tossing a lot of spaghetti against the wall lately and hoping something sticks. 3D movies/gaming (which I think will fail short order), TESLA (again no market), SLi has always been a massive flop no matter how many times it is tried... the only two bright spots seem to be CUDA and TEGRA both not getting massive adoption but have some legs. We shall see but I think the days of separate power-hungry video cards are going the way of the math co-processor.
are u trying to say to us that u mean to say that we should stay away from buying nvidia's shares.
u are at the wrong site.(pls. go to BloggingStocks)
3D gaming and movies will fail?! Are you out of your mind?
Besides one of the biggest markets is the Arch&Viz market right now. Currently Autodesk is the SW leader in this sector and while Autodesk keeps its leading role (as much as might dislike that) nVidia will be a key player, since they have very nice contracts between them to back it up ;)
I for one work in the VFX/Movie/Anim/Ad field and I haven't seen anyone doing their shit on a consumer level graphics. Except for me and a bunch of my friends of course :D but we're not a big established studio (yet!) ;)
No, I think you are both missing my point. I am not giving stock advice, just saying that my outlook is such that I don't have the confidence in NVIDIA like I used to as being a strong company. As for 3D gaming/movies, it has always been a fad and has never caught on. Stereoscopic 3D with required headware/glasses will always be simply a novelty, no one is talking about standard "3D" gaming the likes of which we have had for years... Like the Superbowl commercial and 3D movies, that was new NVIDIA technology. The cards mentioned in this article are not consumer cards, they are entry-level workstation up to very large and expensive ones. As technologies mature they become integrated, like sound cards and NICs sure they are still around but not like they used to be, video will go the same way now that Intel is ready to step in and AMD owns ATI. That's why NVIDIA is looking to create an x86 CPU.
anything related to the xeon line isn't geared to CONSUMER market, although anyone can buy one as long as you have the proper motherboard and registered ECC RAM. apple DOES need to step up their internals if they are really going to call their product something for professionals. i mean at least they offer the radeon hd4870, but that isnt no where near the pro line of cards AMD and Nvidia offer. mac fans need to realize this nonsense and pressure apple to get with the professional graphic card solutions like this nvidia here or the Fire pro line from AMD.
Everyone that reads the word "workstation" needs to realize that these cards are primarily geared towards programs the likes of Catia, Solidworks, and Pro Engineer, not Photoshop. Photoshopers don't need these cards to get their work done, we on the other hand do.
Contrary to popular belief, Photoshop does actually stand to benefit from a faster GPU, the new CS4 version does at least.
There have been a multitude of benchmarks conducted which substantiate this point, and when time is of the essence, or if you have a client coming in that you need to perform a demonstration for, or if you have millions riding on a project and deadlines to meet, then every minute counts.
It is then, that $3000 will feel like a drop in the bucket.
Granted, the average home user/enthusiast need not apply for a loan to grab one of these $3000 cards, but to categorically dismiss them as being superfluous would indeed be a bit myopic shall we say.
well apple most likely knows this, but isn't doing shit about it. it's nice to have a computer that I can upgrade appropriately when a product is needed and not have to buy a new model that is a 6x faster model of the previous generation i need to spend another $(4 digit number here) for a slightly upgraded machine. if apple made midrange TOWERS with either Intel or AMD cpus, I'd grab one just to have one.
schellback,
That would be too easy, you almost make Apple sound like Dell or HP or even the custom builder assembling PC's in his garage.
Of course we all know that Apple doesn't give a damn about giving people value for their dollar. It's all about milking them for every dollar they can spare.
I'm going to look these over carefully. I'm looking for something to replace my old Quadro FX 1400 (a mid-level professional card in its day), which was a huge disappointment - no sizeable increase in performance with 3D applications for having spent a LOT more money, plus terrible support from PNY when it eventually failed (DON'T BUY PNY - it rhymes) and was replaced with this reconditioned piece of crap (all kinds of weird issues with it).
In my estimation, NVidia and ATI have been guilty of nothing less than collusion within the Professional grahics card market, selling essentially the same consumer-level gaming cards with different drivers and charging outrageous prices. Smaller content providers like myself can't compete with that. We/I ended up with what was essentially a low-end graphics card with professional drivers stuck on.
Kind of funny you are looking to replace your FX1400 for something newer. I just had my FX1300 take a dump last week as well as nother co-worker with the same card. I solicited a quote this morning for a couple of 9800 GTX+ to replace them. We run AutoCAD Architecture and will eventually be switching to Revit.
With Autodesk now supporting DirectX as well as openGL, it opens up big possibilities for increased performance for little to no increase in cost. Our next step is makeing the jump to all 64-bit OS. The increased ram capacity will help out even more than upgraded GPUs when it comes time to create large final renderings and video.
Yea, but can it play Crysis?