Aces High Bulletin Board

General Forums => Hardware and Software => Topic started by: Widewing on October 21, 2005, 03:29:54 PM

Title: ATI FireGL V3100 card
Post by: Widewing on October 21, 2005, 03:29:54 PM

My IT manager recently purchased several new workstations for CAD applications and decided to upgrade the video cards prior to issuing the machines to my Department (Engineering). He removed the ATI FireGL V3100 AGP cards and replaced them with V5100 cards. He gave me two of the V3100 cards as the option was dump them in the old equipment room. Installation software is readily available from ATI for $12.

So, my question is this: Is the FireGL card equal or superior to my current ATI XT9600 Radeon, and if it is, should I swap out?

Opinions welcome.

Thanks,

Widewing

Title: ATI FireGL V3100 card
Post by: Skuzzy on October 21, 2005, 03:40:31 PM

As a general rule, workstation graphics cards are not very good for any DirectX type of application (games).  They are designed for a very different type of work (bazillions of polys/verts), and are tuned for OpenGL.

Title: ATI FireGL V3100 card
Post by: Widewing on October 21, 2005, 05:15:32 PM

Thanks Skuzzy. It sounds like it's perfect for my other machine, which is used only for photography work and editing. I'll order the installation CD from ATI. Should be better than the old 64 meg Nvidia card currently in use.

My regards,

Widewing

Title: ATI FireGL V3100 card
Post by: Skuzzy on October 21, 2005, 05:29:09 PM

Definately way overkill for photography.  I assume you mean 2D type of graphics work.

These cards are meant and designed for 3D graphics, and work very well with applications such as 3D Studio Max, Maya, ACAD, and so on.

Title: ATI FireGL V3100 card
Post by: Widewing on October 21, 2005, 08:07:44 PM

Quote

Originally posted by Skuzzy
Definately way overkill for photography.  I assume you mean 2D type of graphics work.

These cards are meant and designed for 3D graphics, and work very well with applications such as 3D Studio Max, Maya, ACAD, and so on.

I also have Co-Create Solid Designer 3D CAD software on the machine, which I use for days when I need to work at home. The Nvidia card is barely adequate, often slow in resolving.

I sometimes work with extremely large photo files (RAW format), thus I installed 2 gigs of RAM.

At the office we went from Radeon 9800 cards to the FireGL V3100 to the current FireGL V5100.

My regards,

Widewing

Title: ATI FireGL V3100 card
Post by: boxboy28 on October 22, 2005, 02:53:14 PM

Wife if thats the case get one of the 9800 for gaming!

Title: ATI FireGL V3100 card
Post by: mipoikel on October 24, 2005, 04:56:59 AM

Why you have to order installation CD, you can download drivers from ATI.

They dont need any extra installation software.

https://support.ati.com/ics/support/default.asp?deptID=894&task=knowledge&folderID=293