video card for 3d animation under 380.00

[Danywachy]

My friend is looking for a video card to use in maya and softimage 3d, his budget is less than 400.00. He was looking for the nvidia workstation cards but I told him to hold on.

He has a pentium 4 at 3.0 and 2.5 gigs of ram. His mother board supports pci 16x.

I was wondering if the experts here in anandtech could give me a hand reccomending him a video card !!! maybe he doesnt need to spend that much, because he would bottle neck the processor, I dont know, any suggestions are welcome.

 

[fierydemise]

How seriously is your friend going to be doing this?

 

[IlllI]

it used to be that the gaming ati/nvidia cards could be flashed to their workstation counterparts. thus saving quite a bit of money. they basically were the same cards, only with a different bios and drivers. i know i was able to do that with my 9800 and turned it into a firegl something or other.

however, i havent kept up with the more recent cards out today, so i'm not sure if this can still be done and/or how easily

 

[Danywachy]

My friend is very serius about animation, he is one of the best I know, he definetely has a lot of future. But at the same time he is not planning in doing the next "toy story" or anything, he just needs something good enough to keep getting better, keep up with school and do the occassionally freelance job that comes in.

 

[Nightmare225]

How's this: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814133165 Best one I could find near that pricepoint...

 

[gxsaurav]

Look for a gfx card with full openGL 2.0 support & good OpenGL drivers, NVIDIA should be better, however, gaming grade cards should not be used but Quadro Costs a lot

a 7600GT PCI-E should be enough, else get a 7800GS AGP if the budget permits, with 256 MB VRAM for holding the viewport

for lower cost, get a 6600GT AGP/PCI-E with 256 MB RAM

 

[wwswimming]

i used a FireGL card on a dual Xeon Dell in a recent job, running a CAD program named One Space Designer.

i use an Asus X850XT PCI-Express card (now avail. for less than $200) on a 3D Studio Max workstation.

comparable performance.

 

[Danywachy]

Originally posted by: gxsaurav
Look for a gfx card with full openGL 2.0 support & good OpenGL drivers, NVIDIA should be better, however, gaming grade cards should not be used but Quadro Costs a lot

a 7600GT PCI-E should be enough, else get a 7800GS AGP if the budget permits, with 256 MB VRAM for holding the viewport

for lower cost, get a 6600GT AGP/PCI-E with 256 MB RAM

You are suggesting to dismiss gaming cards ? so you wouldnt get a gaming card? anyone want to comment on this ?

 

[gxsaurav]

gaming cards are good for gaming, but good enough for 3d work, however, since the have quite a lot of horse power, they work fine, but slow, compared to professional graphics cards such as Quadro & FireGL

i suggested a Geforce card, cos nvidia has better opengl support & drivers, something XSI, Maya , 3DS max will need

 

[ProviaFan]

Originally posted by: Nightmare225
How's this: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814133165 Best one I could find near that pricepoint...

That's a specialty quad-display card that, as far as I can tell, is not designed or optimized for 3D graphics. Perhaps a Quadro FX1300 would be a good choice (it's also within the budget). What I am not sure of is how well a pro-level card based on several years old technology will compare with a current gaming-oriented card at the same price point. I question the idea that the older pro card could still slaughter the newest price-equivalent gaming card; I'd love to see benchmarks to prove one way or the other, as anything else is just idle speculation.

 

[akshayt]

how about a 512mb 7800GTX flashed to quadro 4500?

 

[gsellis]

Not a GeForce. Your answer is Here.

FireGL, Quadro, or Wildcat. The FX1300 gets "no Limitations".

Hint - always check the vendor's support.

 

[ProviaFan]

Originally posted by: akshayt
how about a 512mb 7800GTX flashed to quadro 4500?

Not possible. The old cards could do that, but newer cards are hardwired so that they can't be reflashed.

 

[Sonikku]

Didn't Nvidia physically disable this aspect of their cards so they could rob you blind on higher priced cards?

 

[akshayt]

then go buy a quadro or fire gl if you are really a pro

else go with a radeon 1900XT/XTX class and use it for gaming and pro work.

 

[996GT2]

Do you realize how much a high end Quadro/FireGL costs? His budget is not sky high, and you would know that if you actually READ his post...

Also gaming cards like the 7900GTX/Radeon X1900 are not very good for rendering/CAD and other professional tasks. The reverse is also true; Quadros and FireGLs suck for gaming...