GeForce or Quadro

[ttaylor]

Hello All,

I’ve read through some of the other posts about which GPU’s to use but I have a more specialized question. When using GPU based rendering engines like Lumion I’ve read a good gaming computer will work better. But as far as I’ve been taught Gaming computers - Gaming GPU’s - don’t translate well with CAD hence the Geforce and Quadro families made by Nvidia and then the Titan X to bridge between them.

SketchUp, to me, doesn’t really fit in some of the heavy CAD programs like Solidworks or AutoCAD. So maybe you guys can provide some more detailed info about what SketchUp really needs to function well. I need a GPU like the 1080 to run Lumion effectively at work but I also want to make sure SketchUp will run well. Currently Lumion creates a bit of a bottleneck and I don’t want to turn SketchUp into said bottleneck if I spec a PC that turns into a Lumion machine.

Thanks,

T.

[Anssi]

@ttaylor

SketchUp, to me, doesn’t really fit in some of the heavy CAD programs like Solidworks or AutoCAD

As to hardware requirements, SketchUp is probably quite as demanding as these. Especially, SketchUp requires full OpenGL support. Basic AutoCad uses DirectX and is perhaps capable of running on quite mediocre hardware, especially if the more demanding display modes are not used.

On the other hand, few applications really benefit from the “professional” graphics cards like Nvidia Quadro. Genrally, I would recommend using good “gaming” Nvidias if you don’t use applications that especially list Quadros in their hardware requirements. GPU rendering is usually just dependent of the available CUDA cores, and Quadros usually provide fewer of these if compared to a similarly priced consumer card.

Anssi