I need a good card for 50% games and 50% workstation

[KingRoLo]

I am a designer and work freelance producing graphics, i heavily rely on Studio max to produce my work but equally i like to play games. I was thinking of buying a Quadro but then i thought maybe i could just buy the latest and great 7800GTX and use the OpenGL driver in Studio max to give me acceleration that uses the 7800GTX.

But this is the grey area. How much of an increase do you get from using the Studio Max OpenGL driver utilising your 3D card (albeit the fastest 3d gaming card on the market) as opposed to a Quadro and its dedicated driver.

I was also thinking of doing a the BIOS flash thing to turn a gaming card into a workstation card but i think i have decided against that because producing graphics for clients is my bread and butter and i cant afford to screw my system up, it needs to be a solid workstation first and foremost.

[retsam]

just buy the new 512gtx..then softmod it to a quatro..

But this is the grey area. How much of an increase do you get from using the Studio Max OpenGL driver utilising your 3D card (albeit the fastest 3d gaming card on the market) as opposed to a Quadro and its dedicated driver.the 512gtx is faster then anything out there even the quatro... like i said softmod it to a quatro...nvidia's opngl support in unmatched in the industry...

[ew2x4]

As far as I know, you can't softmod the 7800 cards, and only a some of the 6800 series cards. If you consider the Workstation aspect to be most important, get a quadro, definately. I have a quadro 1400 (6800 equivilent) and it's one of the best for Max and its value. I can also game very well with it (It's between a 6800nu and GT).

[superklye]

just buy the new 512gtx..then softmod it to a quatro..

the 512gtx is faster then anything out there even the quatro... like i said softmod it to a quatro...nvidia's opngl support in unmatched in the industry...
Isn't the Quadro 4500 a 7800GTX 512?

[cgordonfreeman]

I have a brand new Quadro FX4400 512mb that I'm selling at the moment. I'm looking for a GTX 512 for it or the equivilent cash. Check out my post in the For Sale/Trade section for details.

[cgordonfreeman]

By the way, just to tell you, the Quadro does its OpenGL in hardware (due to the NV45GL core) so it's way faster than a soft modded 7800. Plus hardware AA is nice too :)

[Dr_s99]

Question, i have a Geforce 4 Ti 4600
if i softmod it ( or what ever its called)!

would i loose any performance in games?
because i use MAYA and 3D studio max... and I PLAY LOTs of games!


and wouldn't Softmod damage the hardware?

and if i do use softmod can i return it back to normal?

[superklye]

From what I understand, and I could very well be wrong, but Softmod stands for "software modification" which means it's a layer between Windows and your card that is modifying it to work like a Quadro, as opposed to a hardmod which would be "hardware modification" and is being done permanently.

[Fackamato]

By the way, just to tell you, the Quadro does its OpenGL in hardware (due to the NV45GL core) so it's way faster than a soft modded 7800. Plus hardware AA is nice too :)

I don't understand this. So, your'e basically saying that Quadro cards accelerates OpenGL in hardware, and "ordinary" cards do that in software??!

[cgordonfreeman]

I don't understand this. So, your'e basically saying that Quadro cards accelerates OpenGL in hardware, and "ordinary" cards do that in software??!

Sorry, I should specify. Quadros (as far as I know) have a core that is more optimised for professional OpenGL rendering than normal Geforces. Thats what I got from the Quadro vs. Geforce techsheet from nVidia. Features like multiple clip region support and overlay plane support speed the Quadros up in comparison to the Geforce family also.

[dogboy]

This will probably sound very dumb but I've wanted to know for a long time. For games, will the quadro counterpart of the 7800 GTX perform better than the 7800 GTX?

[ew2x4]

Quadros will perform about the same. My Quadro 1400 out performs my 6800nu in gaming and they're the same chip. I, personally would suggest a quadro. Great gaming performance, AND tremendous workstation (max) peformance. I'm betting a 7800 GTX won't get close to a Quadro 1400 in Max. In gaming, on my 1400, I can run FEAR at 1600x1200 with almost everything turned up at consistant good speeds.

[dogboy]

thanks ew2x4