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Author Topic: Power supplies and "professional" graphics cards with Lumion  (Read 4391 times)

Member2606

    Reputation: 0
June 10, 2011, 10:16:43 pm
Our architecture firm has been using Lumion for about 6 months now.  One challenge we are facing is finding gaming cards that are compatible with our current professional workstation power supplies.  For example, we purchased an EVGA GeForce GTX 590 and installed it in an existing Precision T7400.  The T7400 has a 1100W power supply, but it only has (2) 6-pin PCI-e power cables.  The GTX 590 requires (2) 8-pin cables.  2 (dual-6 pin to 8 pin) adapters came with the card, but this requires (4) 6-pin PCI cables.  Anyway, we were able to tweak it a little by using some other adapters, but I'm afraid the card isn't running at full capacity (Lumion only detects 1.5 of the 3GB on board memory).  Also, EVGA does not support any other power adapter configuration.

Because of the power restrictions and potentional issues of using gaming cards with applications like Revit, Autocad and 3ds Max, we have resorted to using professional cards with at least 2 GB of RAM.  One surprising benchmark we found:

From the same workstation, the ATI Firepro V7800 2GB (~$400 card) rendered still images and movies at a faster rate than the Nvidia GeForce 5000 ($~1200 card).  (saving a poster-sized still image - Firepro V7800, 2.5 minutes vs. Quadro 5000, 5.5 minutes.  creating a 640x480 movie - Firepro V7800, 7.5 minutes vs. Quadro 5000, 9.5 mins) FPS while moving around the scene came out the same ~ 20-25 FPS for both cards. 

Anyway, I'm curious to hear what "professional" graphics cards others are using and would recommend. Thanks.

Member1553

    Reputation: 33
Re: Power supplies and "professional" graphics cards with Lumion
« Reply #1 on: June 10, 2011, 10:29:52 pm »
June 10, 2011, 10:29:52 pm
I'm curious how you make the distinction between the Nvidia card and the ATI card as one being professional and the other gaming, is that based on name or specs?

I thought the only industry recognised CAD optimised card was the Nvidia Quadro

Member871

    Reputation: 16
Re: Power supplies and "professional" graphics cards with Lumion
« Reply #2 on: June 10, 2011, 11:36:03 pm »
June 10, 2011, 11:36:03 pm
I would go for GeForce GTX 590
Do not buy expensive  "workstation" graphical cards as Quadros, they are way slower for Lumion!!
Lumion, Quest3D and SketchUp reseller, training and support.

Member1388

    Reputation: 43
Re: Power supplies and "professional" graphics cards with Lumion
« Reply #3 on: June 10, 2011, 11:36:54 pm »
June 10, 2011, 11:36:54 pm
Personally I run AutoCad 2012, some Revit, Sketchup, games etc.  and i am running an ATI card.  I will say i have had more trouble with Quadro cards and their divers then they have "helped" me in CADD etc.  I know that you get the error message that "this card is not optimized...blah blah blah", but for your money i would not restrict yourself because one software company tells you this is the best card for one application.  My two cents, but i know others that swear by Quadro cards.  Issue really is there are different technologies being used for each of these softwares.  Solely for Lumion, a "gaming" card will be your best bet.

Member2853

    Reputation: 21
Re: Power supplies and "professional" graphics cards with Lumion
« Reply #4 on: June 11, 2011, 01:18:39 am »
June 11, 2011, 01:18:39 am
I think that for lumion the 580gtx 3go is the best actually for nvidia cards ... somewhere in the forum you will find a post about graphic card...
i resume...590 is a bi gpu and the memory is split in two...so 1.5go for 3go of memory it is like that for lumion but also for game... It is a matter of hardware...
With big memory you can load heavy model heavy texture... and the 580 is the fastest single gpu actually so.... gamer card is better and faster for lumion.... and it's less expansive...

i have the phamtom gtx580 3go... it rocks  })
Amenagement Urbanisme Architecture Design

www.auad.fr

Member1924

    Reputation: 28
Re: Power supplies and "professional" graphics cards with Lumion
« Reply #5 on: June 11, 2011, 02:40:11 am »
June 11, 2011, 02:40:11 am
hi Dichiwaka

We're using several graphic cards to test lumion with differents configurations in the same workstation. The base is Dell 2xQuadCore 2.56 Mhz with 16 Gb Ram. We've tested PNY Quadro 4000, 2Gb Ram, Nvidia Quadro FX3800 1Gb Ram and Gainward GeForce® GTX 590 3072MB GDDR5.

For architectural works, we've opted for Quadro 4000, more estable and accurate for us. But for Lumion we've got better speed results with Gainward. In prices, Nvidia Quadro cards are much more expensive than GTX.

For other rendering software, (Bunkspeed, Luxion, Houdini....) we use tesla cards (C0250 and C0150) in adition to Quadro.


Member1296

    Reputation: 4
Re: Power supplies and "professional" graphics cards with Lumion
« Reply #6 on: June 11, 2011, 09:02:56 am »
June 11, 2011, 09:02:56 am
I think that for lumion the 580gtx 3go is the best actually for nvidia cards ... somewhere in the forum you will find a post about graphic card...
i resume...590 is a bi gpu and the memory is split in two...so 1.5go for 3go of memory it is like that for lumion but also for game... It is a matter of hardware...
With big memory you can load heavy model heavy texture... and the 580 is the fastest single gpu actually so.... gamer card is better and faster for lumion.... and it's more expansive...

i have the phamtom gtx580 3go... it rocks  })

i second that. I'd love to go for a pair of 580 3G rather than 590 3GB. Memory footprint of 590 only 1.5GB for each gpu and one thing is 580s SLI have better scaling than one 590.

Member2606

    Reputation: 0
Re: Power supplies and "professional" graphics cards with Lumion
« Reply #7 on: June 20, 2011, 10:43:38 pm »
June 20, 2011, 10:43:38 pm
I'm curious how you make the distinction between the Nvidia card and the ATI card as one being professional and the other gaming, is that based on name or specs?

I thought the only industry recognised CAD optimised card was the Nvidia Quadro

NVIDIA and ATI "Professional" Cards =  Quadro and FirePro
NVIDIA and ATI "Gaming" Cards = GeForce and Radeon

Autodesk generally recommends professional cards to run their software products (3ds Max, Revit, Autocad)