For working at home I use a Quadro as they're more stable and glitch free for GPU stuff. You can get a good Quadro for cheap on Ebay.
If you insist on GeForce, I'd go with a 560, 295, or 260. Matt From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Meng-Yang Lu Sent: Monday, August 20, 2012 11:56 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Graphic card for a workstation again So glad I asked. Hahaha. I knew your thorough personality yields the best answers. Thanks much! -Lu On Mon, Aug 20, 2012 at 11:53 AM, Matt Lind <ml...@carbinestudios.com<mailto:ml...@carbinestudios.com>> wrote: Anybody using Softimage in our building only use Nvidia GeForce. We have many models and found some better than others. The 200 series is very stable, the 400 series should be avoided at all costs, the 500 series is a mixed bag (560 good, 580 tempermental). We just got a few computers with the 670 and breaking them in as we speak. I'm the only person in the company using a Quadro as I have to determine if bugs experienced in production are due to hardware or software before filing a bug report. On the few occasions we experience problems, it's usually an OpenGL crash to blue screen or overheating - both are driver issues. We also discovered mixing and matching consumer and professional components in the same box is a bad idea. Either buy a consumer level computer with a consumer level graphics card, or buy a professional workstation with a professional graphics card. When you mix and match you run into driver related issues as the consumer lines like GeForce don't go through the same level of QA and certification as the Quadro line - GeForces seem to be tested on a much narrower band of hardware configurations. Although Nvidia releases driver updates more frequently for the GeForce product line, you'll be waiting much longer for patches to fix things in Softimage than with the Quadro line. About 6 months in my unscientific observations. As much as people complain here about Quadros being crappy, crash prone, and over priced, I will say I have significantly fewer problems than my colleagues here at the studio. Matt From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com<mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com> [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com<mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com>] On Behalf Of Meng-Yang Lu Sent: Monday, August 20, 2012 11:37 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com<mailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com> Subject: Re: Graphic card for a workstation again Can you say which cards you guys are using, Matt? In the process of building a system to do some GPU stuff alongside some 3D tests at home. Thanks, -Lu On Mon, Aug 20, 2012 at 11:22 AM, Matt Lind <ml...@carbinestudios.com<mailto:ml...@carbinestudios.com>> wrote: We are a games development studio making MMORPG games. Most of the computers we buy come stocked with ATI Radeons, but no matter how much we try to make them work, they just don't. Crashes, glitches, overheating, etc... We always have to swap them out for Nvidia GeForce cards to get stability. Framerate isn't everything, stability often matters more. Matt From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com<mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com> [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com<mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com>] On Behalf Of Mirko Jankovic Sent: Friday, August 17, 2012 10:30 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com<mailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com> Subject: Re: Graphic card for a workstation again Maybe it is so but it still doesn't change the fact that after replacing gtx580 with radeon7970 I got HUGE improvement in frame rates in viewport and no problems at all as well :) It seems that all new gtx cards after 280 are crippled in an effort to push overpriced quadros. But ofc we need to make differences between big studios on one side (usually huge budgets :)) and small to mid studios and freelancers.
