Update: AMD 7970M vs nVidia 675M

flirting on a notebook forum, that ought to work

 

possible im sure theres atleast 6 women on NBR. im hoping im not the only one over 40 though

 

sry fr my ignorence but what is "compute performance " ??

 

Compute = cuda and the like.

 

So, for CAD, CAE, Maya, etc, I have concluded that the best thing is the Radeon 7970M or a quadro K5000M or a quadro 5010M. But which one is better of the three? I have read that the Fermi architecture beats Kepler in these domains, but I've also read that the 7970 (no M) beats the GTX keplers and fermis. However, that doesnt mean that the 7970M beats the quadros. So does it or not?

Thanks!

 

Even if you are, you're still my favorite female moderator...

 

ok for most NON CUDA requirements from what I am seeing

7970 desktop >>>>>> 7970m >/= k5000 >> q5000

Autocad makes ZERO difference if you are not using additional plugins or linked applications. it is purely bound to the speed of your first 2 CPU cores.
CAE is tougher some use CUDA ( k5000 and q5010 best ) some use OpenCL or direct compute ( 7970m fastest but the desktop 7970 flattens them all )
MAYA for only the immediate future swings towards CUDA ( quadro cards ) but in most cases the firepros are on par and I hear the 7970m can almost match a k5000 ( no actual hands on confirmation )

te best advice is look at each app individually, see which gain a large benifit with CUDA ( over 30% increase ) and if enough of the ones you need most will benifit get the quadro k5000. if your most used and needed applications wont get a 30% boost with CUDA, dont waste your time or money on a quadro get a fire pro or 7970m

CUDA in apps listed or suggested

CAD = 0 increase with CUDA alone. addons can change that but IMO no major benifit
Solidworks = little to no benifit
MAYA = Minimal benifit
CAE apps, Vary drastically see the software providor

now in ALL cases a Kepler based Gforce card is a disadvantage

Thanks HT its a recent promotion and I hope Im dropping into the role good. Drop by my areas @ WNSIB, Apple and HP and say hi now and then, and as always give the good advice you normally give

 

Thank you for the help! . As I read from what you wrote, the k5000m would be a bit better than the 5010M (i guess the q means the previous generation (fermi)). And the AMDs would be better as long as there are no significant CUDA optimization (however it seems that opencl has more future: OpenCL vs CUDA misconceptions - Blog - StreamComputing ). So my next question is wether the 7970M (Radeon) is better than the M8900 (FirePro), because the FirePro is marketed as more workstation oriented than Radeon just the same way quadro and GTX are.

 

right now the 7970m is way up on the older m8900 for many things as it is based off the 6970m of the previous generation. I dont have CL benchmarks for either the m8900/6970 but the 7970m is a slightly underclocked 7870 Desktop card.

the big thing that comes into play is if your apps need the FP's certified drivers to operate properly or enable extra GPGPU functionality