nVIDIA Quadro NVS 140M

Hi, I was considering purchasing a T61 laptop, and I was wondering if someone here had an idea about the power/capability of this card. Realize it's only been put out recently, but any insight would be great! Current laptop has a ATI X1400 256MB, how would these compare?

On a side note: I have also heard that a further upgraded card will be available in the T61 starting mid-June, any thoughts?

 

It might be a little better than the x1400, though I would guess it would be marginal at best. I think it's based off the 8300M or maybe the 8400M. Either way, it is a card designed for CAD and business uses, not gaming. You'll likely have better luck with drivers if you stick to a Geforce or Radeon card.

 

This AnandTech page suggests that the NVIDIA Quadro NVS 140M is based off of the 8400M ("business" version of it according to the page, whatever that means).

The ordering seems to suggest that it's on par with the 8400M GT -- but that's an assumption.

 

As I understand the difference between the Geforce and the Quadros is that you can program and customize the functions of the latter to use with specific programs. I don't know of any direct advantage that they could offer to normal cad usage. So I guess it would be ok for gaming.
That thinkpad computer looks very good, particularly after those sale prices. I'm seriously considering it. The price is really goood.
If only that graphic card were a little bit more powerful.....

 

I am uncertain of the differences between a "business" Quadro and "workstation" Quadro as well. If the NVS 140M is really an 8400GT, it does not sound bad for a 14.1" notebook.

 

There's a weird myth that those cards aren't "for gaming" on this forum-- to the point where I've seen one of the guys who runs the site refuse to post gaming benchmarks.

How does that make sense? Post the benchmarks so we can decide if we want to use them to game. These notebooks pop up on Craigslist and eBay, and sometimes it's a much better deal than something new with a "gaming" card.

 

The drivers are different, though it is correct that the hardware is essentially the same.The synthetic benchmarks show almost equal scores, but I will happy to see some real-life benchmarks.

 

Is it possible to use GeForce drivers on a Quadro card such as the 140m?

 

Maybe it is, I've seen somewhere that you can unlock the functionality of a Quadro in a normal Geforce.
What I wonder though is if for equal cores, the more sophisticated graphics driver gives you a performance hit in the quadros.

 

I've seen a benchmark that puts the Quadro NVS 140M at 1,800 3DMark06 marks. That's quite high for a mid-range graphics card, and that's a few hundred points below the Geforce Go 7600/Radeon X1600. It certainly beats the Geforce Go 7400, which can never go past 1,000.

 

The only difference between 3dMark and a game is that 3DMark has CPU benchmarks to go along with the graphics. "Synthetic" I think means that it combines several together, like how geography is a synthetic discipline. I believe somewhere along the line people took that to mean "fake".

 

That Quadro NVS140m is probably quite overclockable dontchathink?

 

Quadro cards are designed for CAD and business applications, but there are two different types. You have the Quadro FX cards (such as mine), which are designed for 3D CAD applications, and typically perform quite well at games given they are high end cards (the Quadro FX 350M isn't so great). The difference from a Geforce is that the drivers typically have more options a lot of presets for apps such as Solid Works and PRO/E, and they typically have better OpenGL support since most CAD apps use OpenGL rather than DirectX (so OpenGL games like Doom, Quake, and Prey usually scream on my card and dip no lower than 55fps at max settings and high res). They also are typically ISV certified and cost more.

The Quadro NVS on the other hand is geared toward business users. According to nVidia's website, they are designed for "professional 2D applications." They generally aren't meant for gaming and are designed more to provide some 3D acceleration for CAD, but most of the advantages being in clearer picture quality and higher resolutions for multiple monitors and graphics setups. They provide much better color calibration options for photographers than your typical Intel offerings.

There is a common misconception that Quadros can not game, because that has traditionally been the case. Desktop Quadros have been said to not be able to game at all and have serious artifacts, because, as I said, they are really OpenGL cards and don't take much into consideration for DirectX (which is what most games use). Mobile Quadros are based on the mobile Geforce cards from what I've seen (probably to save money and development costs), and typically perform as well (or better in some cases) than their Geforce counterparts, but their counterparts are usually the low-end cards like the 7400s and 7300s or high end DTR cards like the 7900s. There's not really any Quadros analogous to a 7600 or 7700 (or 8600), so they're usually ruled out for people wanting a gaming laptop in a 15.4" or 14" form factor in favor of other choices like the Asus A8j series.

 

Wow!! thank you! That was thorough!!
So the next question would be... Has anybody used the NVS 140 for gaming? How well does it perform?
I'm very tempted by the t61 and the business application of the card actually suit me perfectly (as I work in architecture), so I might as well buy it.

 

The t61p coming soon would be 15.4" and have the nvidia quadro 570m, which should be better for gaming (equivalent to the 8600 series and based on them hopefully rather than the 8400 series).

 

true, but I really want the 14' screen instead of a 15,4. And I want to use the discount they're running right now.

 

Why don't you stick with your current notebook and upgrade next year or something?

 

Current notebook is a 17" behemoth, and not mine (family's). This one would just be for me
Probably going to wait for the T61P myself (15.4" is preferred for me), though price might just be an issue (hopefully a nice big student discount)

 

because it's an HP zd7000 which has the power plug problem and I kind of hate it now.

 

As it sounds now, the ATI Fire GL 5200 (256 MB video RAM) sounds like a decently capable graphics card (based on x1600) as available in the T60p.

Any idea of how it will stack up to the apparently 8400-based NVIDIA Quadro FX 570M?

I'm really curious because i've seen this link cited as showing the 570M to be based off the 8600 series NVIDIA cards, but the table suggests it's a workstation version of some variant of the 8400 model.

 

June 5th it is... (I suppose we wait...)

 

As I said in the Thinkpad T61p discussion, I don't think the Quadro FX 570M will be based off the 8400M, for a number of reasons:

1. Logic ... the main separating feature between the "p" models is the graphics card. For instance, the T60p had twice the graphics power compared to the T60 (FireGL v5250, based off the Radeon X1700, versus the Radeon X1400). It makes no sense for the T61, which has a Quadro NVS 140M, based off the 8400M core, to have the same graphics power as the T61p, which would have an FX 570M.

2. The FX 570M's specs closely resemble the 8600M series, most notably the 8600M GS. The FX 570M is 128-bit, unlike the 8400M series, which is 64-bit, save for the 8400M GT, which is 128-bit. However, the 8400M GT has a memory bandwidth of only 19 Gb/s. The 8600M series, as well as the 570M, all have memory bandwidths of 22.4 Gb/s.


I guess we'll see on June 5th whether or not the 570M is based off the 8600M or the 8400M. My argument rests on the assumption that the T61p offering the FX 570M will be a 15.4" laptop. If there is a 14.1" T61p, then it's totally possible that the FX 570M is based off the 8400. I would then worry about graphics power on the larger 15.4" version of the T61p.