NVIDIA Announces Quadro 400 Professional Graphics Card

[btarunr]

NVIDIA announced today the NVIDIA Quadro 400 graphics processing unit (GPU), a new professional graphics solution that puts the power of the GPU in the hands of designers and engineers. Built for use with professional applications, such as Autodesk AutoCAD, the NVIDIA Quadro 400 GPU provides up to 5X faster performance over high-end consumer gaming cards. It also gives up to 10X improvement when running industry leading CAD/CAM applications.

Priced at just $169, the Quadro 400 GPU also offers excellent power efficiency, consuming less than 35 watts, and its low-profile footprint means it offers the flexibility to fit into any workstation, including small form-factor systems.



With 512 MB of DDR3 memory, the Quadro 400 processor enables professionals to interact with a wide range of design models. It also provides high visual fidelity, featuring a 30-bit (10-bits per color) color engine with a dynamic range of over one billion color variations. Quadro 400 drivers are optimized and certified on leading professional applications.

"Designers and engineers, whether designing the largest assemblies or smallest components, rely on Quadro," said Jeff Brown, general manager, Professional Solutions Group, NVIDIA. "The Quadro 400 is the right tool to help ensure that job gets done the right way, especially when it comes to running professional apps like Autodesk AutoCAD."

Additional features of the new Quadro 400 GPU include:

• Unified Driver Architecture - Guarantees forward and backward compatibility with professional application software drivers, and simplifies upgrading to a new solution.
• Hardware 3D Window Clipping - Accelerated clip regions enable faster data transfer between a window and the frame buffer to improve overall graphics performance.
• High-Quality Display Connectivity - Drives ultra-high-resolution panels, producing phenomenal image quality, supporting two active connectors, including dual-link DVI with up to 3840 x 2400 resolution @ 24Hz on each panel, and DisplayPort (DP) with up to 2560 x 1600 resolution.
• NVIDIA Mosaic Technology - Enhances workspace across up to eight displays (using one card per two displays), enabling seamless taskbar spanning, as well as transparent scaling of any application. Works over multiple displays or a single high-resolution display, and with NVIDIA nView desktop management software.

The NVIDIA Quadro 400 processor also supports NVIDIA 3D Vision and 3D Vision Pro active shutter glasses 3D technology that delivers crystal-clear, stereoscopic 3D visualization for the most immersive 3D experience, ranging from desktop workstations to collaborative work spaces.

Designed, Built and Engineered by NVIDIA to the Highest Standards of Quality
As with all Quadro professional graphics cards, the Quadro 400 is designed, built and warranted by NVIDIA to provide industry-leading performance and reliability when running professional applications. Companies consistently certify Quadro professional graphics solutions for their users whose livelihoods depend on them.

Availability and Pricing
The Quadro 400 ($169 MSRP, USD) is available immediately for the HP Z800, Z600, and Z400 Workstations, and for all Fujitsu CELSIUS workstations. It will be available later this month and next on select Lenovo ThinkStation D20, C20, S20 and E30 models. It's also available from NVIDIA Quadro channel partners including PNY Technologies in North America and Europe, ELSA in Japan, and Leadtek in Asia Pacific.

View at TechPowerUp Main Site

 

[R_1]

Is it better than Sandy Bridge IGP?

 

[Red_Machine]

What architecture is this based on? Fermi?

 

[Imsochobo]

NVIDIA Quadro 400 GPU provides up to 5X faster performance over high-end consumer gaming cards. It also gives up to 10X improvement when running industry leading CAD/CAM applications.

Educate me...
where does this come from, in my company we ALWAYS turn to the gaming cards for the most demanding applications and alike.
and people find their cheapo desktop computers here faster than the "professional" ones.
we have some high end AMD ones that work pretty well, and some decent nvidia, but they never ever match the gaming ones...
we just don't put gaming ones as a standard due to drivers, and we expect issues to be quickly resolved with professional ones.

so how can they be quicker when we really notice gaming ones being better than the fastest professional ? they're pretty much identical except gaming ones have better specs in the high end.

 

[D4S4]

they are simply trying to rip off everyone as much as they can. this card looks ridiculous - it's their lowest end gpu yet costs 170$

it's as ridiculous as your download speed

 

[Kreij]

We use professional grade cards (both camps) here at the shop for the CAD and CAM system.
The reason being that they are far more accurate at tight tolerances (thousanths), which can be noted when performing extreme zooming of geomerty.

As far as their performance improvement claims over regular cards, I have no idea what they are doing to see that kind of gain.

I should also note that I have replaced more Quadro based cards due to failures than any other components on my network.
That could be simple luck-of-the-draw, but after the sixth one failed, I started getting ATI pro cards and none have failed.

 

[D4S4]

well yeah, quadro have unlocked features like 40-bit color depth and some other stuff (that i am not well informed about) and that's the only reason for the price bump.

i wonder if the riva tuner is still capable of unlocking quadro features on ordinary cards... tbh, i haven't even seen riva tuner in last couple of years but i remember it had the ability to turn geforce fx's to quadros

 

[toastem2004]

What architecture is this based on? Fermi?

Its basicly a GT 220. On the nvidia page, its 48 cuda cores, directX 10.1 - GT216 core

 

[Trackr]

well yeah, quadro have unlocked features like 40-bit color depth and some other stuff (that i am not well informed about) and that's the only reason for the price bump.

i wonder if the riva tuner is still capable of unlocking quadro features on ordinary cards... tbh, i haven't even seen riva tuner in last couple of years but i remember it had the ability to turn geforce fx's to quadros

No, that hasn't been possible since the G80..

Although, by the looks of it, that is still more powerful than this card.

 

[Captain.Abrecan]

Well, based on my personal experience: the Quadro line is the leading hardware for engineering computations. Solidworks, Pro/ENGINEER, Pro/MECHANICA, Autodesk Inventor, Autodesk AutoCAD, Bentley Microstation, Bentley AutoPlant, Bentley Powerdraft, Pro CAM, CAM Route Pro, Autodesk Revit, Autodesk Maya, Autodesk 3DS Max, Autodesk Mechanical Desktop, Catia, & definitely COSMOS.

If you absolutely need to render a whole factory floor at once, or a power plant scrubber (total "as built" assembly), you need a high end Quadro. If you need to work with a large assembly (jet engine versus whole airplane) you still need a mid range quadro. The quadros are not overpriced. If you put 4x GTX 580's in a workstation you have about a third of a Quadro 6000.

Now, not everyone needs one of those...most drawings/parts and assemblies are done in a lightweight, external reference manner. The desktop performance for the card in question is actually matched by gaming cards, (as my fellows have pointed out) but not in CAD. These cards, somehow, do more math for a CAD program than gaming cards do. They handle more triangles, more vertexes, more constraints, more algorithms. They don't do textures well though, so they suck for games.

This would be good only for someone who makes electrical or piping diagrams with AutoCAD, nothing more than that really. You would need a $200 gaming card to keep up with this in CAD. If you are on a IT team with a budget, you need that price difference.

Judging by the looks of it though, TPU forumites already love Solidworks+Quadro combo:
http://img.techpowerup.org/091201/LED%20Test%20fit.jpg

Disclaimer: I am in a lucky position, that most of the companies I have worked for have given me better computers than the rest of the engineering crew, as a demand of the contracting environment. Without those experiences, I would not get to see what those $5000 cards can do. Source below is google

 

[NC37]

Exactly. I remember when Apple first got a Quadro in the towers. Bunch of people were jumping on it thinking it was the greatest for gaming. But the things didn't even come close. Ended up with a bunch throwing fits because they thought they had been ripped off. Powerful cards but they aren't made for handling game apps.

 

[TheGuruStud]

I see nvidia is still doing the ol driver switcharoo trick.