Stephen Knapp
May 12th, 2007, 12:16 AM
In my continuing efforts to build a decent upgrade for editing DV and HDV, I'm zeroing in on a Dual Xeon workstation. But I'm struggling with a couple of choices and would like to hear some opinions. First of all I am torn between the two video cards named in the title. Here are a couple of HP white papers on them:
http://h18000.www1.hp.com/products/quickspecs/12299_na/12299_na.HTML
NVIDIA Quadro FX 3450 Graphics Controller
http://h18000.www1.hp.com/products/quickspecs/12499_na/12499_na.HTML
NVIDIA Quadro FX 1500 Graphics Controller
A company called ADK Videoediting configures systems, and for a Xeon workstation their default choice is the 3450. The 1500 is $463 less by their numbers, it's not the default choice, but in their features-line at the top of the page, that is the card they specifically mention as a point of attraction. I'm confused by that. Videoguys, also recommend the 3450 for their Xeon Workstation recommendation, but they seem to think it retails at $600 as of April 2007. The best price I have seen is in the neighborhood of $900 (versus about $500 for the FX1500). They don't explain their preference.
The thing is, as I look at the specs and features, I see the 3450 as the better of the two for CAD or graphics rendering (animation), but I have my doubts that it really is better for video editing. Both cards have dual DVI outs supporting a max res of 3840x2400 on dual-link lines, but the 3450 only has one dual-link output whereas the 1500 has two. The 1500 also has an out for HDTV in component and composite mode, while the 3450 has none. The 3450 does accommodate SLI hookups, but do I need that for a simple two monitor workstation editing HDV?
Avid Liquid is GPU intensive, and I can't tell which of these two cards has more of the kind of oomph that will let that NLE do its thing. I know they will both be superb, but when the pricepoint is so different, I want to know what I am gaining or losing by going with the cheaper card.
Since I also use After Effects for compositing, and will have the new Adobe Production Suite on the same system as the current version of AL (7.2), I need to look at the performance benefits of these cards for those tools as well.
Can anybody give me some insight here? Why do the video system configuration pros seem to lean toward the Quadro FX 3450 over the FX 1500? What am I missing?
I'll save my CPU question for a separate thread.
-Stephen
http://h18000.www1.hp.com/products/quickspecs/12299_na/12299_na.HTML
NVIDIA Quadro FX 3450 Graphics Controller
http://h18000.www1.hp.com/products/quickspecs/12499_na/12499_na.HTML
NVIDIA Quadro FX 1500 Graphics Controller
A company called ADK Videoediting configures systems, and for a Xeon workstation their default choice is the 3450. The 1500 is $463 less by their numbers, it's not the default choice, but in their features-line at the top of the page, that is the card they specifically mention as a point of attraction. I'm confused by that. Videoguys, also recommend the 3450 for their Xeon Workstation recommendation, but they seem to think it retails at $600 as of April 2007. The best price I have seen is in the neighborhood of $900 (versus about $500 for the FX1500). They don't explain their preference.
The thing is, as I look at the specs and features, I see the 3450 as the better of the two for CAD or graphics rendering (animation), but I have my doubts that it really is better for video editing. Both cards have dual DVI outs supporting a max res of 3840x2400 on dual-link lines, but the 3450 only has one dual-link output whereas the 1500 has two. The 1500 also has an out for HDTV in component and composite mode, while the 3450 has none. The 3450 does accommodate SLI hookups, but do I need that for a simple two monitor workstation editing HDV?
Avid Liquid is GPU intensive, and I can't tell which of these two cards has more of the kind of oomph that will let that NLE do its thing. I know they will both be superb, but when the pricepoint is so different, I want to know what I am gaining or losing by going with the cheaper card.
Since I also use After Effects for compositing, and will have the new Adobe Production Suite on the same system as the current version of AL (7.2), I need to look at the performance benefits of these cards for those tools as well.
Can anybody give me some insight here? Why do the video system configuration pros seem to lean toward the Quadro FX 3450 over the FX 1500? What am I missing?
I'll save my CPU question for a separate thread.
-Stephen