What is the best 3D card ?

[jmarhoon]

Hi all ..

I want to know what is the best 3D Card available in the market that can be used in 3D Studio Max, so the rendering will be as fast as it can be with 3D Studio Max ?

please reply to me, I want to buy it, if it is available , what ever the price is ... my main concern is the rendering speed ..

waiting ...

[FutureMan]

Unfortunatally the 3d card has nothing to do with rendering speed, it only helps with the viewports, displaying more polys and better textures. Although I'm not sure about the whole real-time\game situation.

So for rendering I'm pretty sure it's all in the CPU and Ram, although I suppose the Virtual ram(Hard Drive) can come into as well.

[jbw]

Do you mean on screen viewport rendering or rendering a pic or animation?
If it's the pic or animation you're rendering then Futureman's correct - your gfx card won't do much for rendering cos that's dealt with by your CPU and RAM.
If you mean on-screen viewport rendering then I'd have a look at any of the NVIDIA quadro (750XGL+) and the 3DLABS wildcat ranges. These will give you decent cards with good stable drivers. I'm afraid I'd steer clear of FIRE GL cards... their drivers are kack! IMHO

ta,
jbw

[jmarhoon]

But guys, someone told me about an expensive card, I forgot it's name. he said it is only for 3D Studio Max software, it can render any rendering a pic or animation in few seconds ..

Correct me, if this wrong ...

[jbw]

Oh... you mean the A.R.T PURE rendering card? You're very own render farm from a PCI slot!!! Yep I've seen reviews of these apparently they're quite good... but have you seen the price £2650!!! I'd rather get a dual Xeon or build a couple of dual Athlons to do my rendering at that price! Take a look at:

http://www.art.co.uk/products.ihtml?page=pureoverview

I doubt very much that it can render anything in a few seconds... :)

ta,
jbw

[blesson2k]

This is one topic that that has me going in circles [sigh].

For example, try this for size:

An Athlon XP 2000+ machine with 512 MB DDR RAM and Geforce 3 MX440 rendered out the first frame of waterfall.max in 36 secs. Never got that speed performance in machines with higher configs. I know rendering uses the Ram and processor but this machine beats them all (Even a 2700+ XP with 512 MB DDR and Geforce 4 8460 takes more time!!!).

[mac5er]

if u are using only 3d programs
(not games)
i suppose
a quadro is the best choise
its a bit expensive
but i think it has the best preformance
in 3d programs

what ever the price is ... my main concern is the rendering speed ..

4 the last time ill explain
A videocard doesnt effect the rendering speed of
max EVER!!!!
It only calculates the real time images
not the renderings!!

[Schwinnz]

The best one actually is the Quadro FX 2000. But it's very expensive. The only problem it won't accelerate your render times.

[Schwinnz]

Originally posted by blesson2k
This is one topic that that has me going in circles [sigh].

For example, try this for size:

An Athlon XP 2000+ machine with 512 MB DDR RAM and Geforce 3 MX440 rendered out the first frame of waterfall.max in 36 secs. Never got that speed performance in machines with higher configs. I know rendering uses the Ram and processor but this machine beats them all (Even a 2700+ XP with 512 MB DDR and Geforce 4 8460 takes more time!!!).

That's not normal

[blesson2k]

An SGI under the hood?:)

[Kit]

blesson2k:

There are other things that influence how good your machine is! For example having a crappy motherboard will really trash rendering times.

[Schwinnz]

Originally posted by blesson2k
An SGI under the hood?:)

SGI are not as good as before. Their price is still too high for the performance they give. A clone dual Xeon will cost maybe less and will provide better performance.