quadro

[wuhlei]

does quadro use the same stereo3d drivers or is it built in?

[Tril]

I'm not 100% sure but I'll tell you what I think.

The Quadro range of cards is marketed toward use in professional applications. Professional applications usually use OpenGL and they sometime have built-in support for stereo. For example, you can use a plugin in SolidWorks to display parts and assemblies in stereo.

[wuhlei]

Thanks hmm is the quadro driver any different?

[martinlandau]

I have seen benchmarks runs comparing the professional FX quadro's to the lower end consumer grade geforce adapters in games. Frame rates are similar, but you would intuitively think Quadro boards have superior stereo3d since they have hardware 3din stereo port and designed with stereo3d in mind. I have just purchased FX Quadro 3500, Emagin Z800 and Nvidia 169 level drivers installed last night. I also have bought crystal eyes 3, and CRT projector, but no IR emitter so far so that is on hold.

Only have one 3d game right now - Half Life - the original. Could not get it to work with older Nvidia drivers. New drivers don't have the stereo tab option in the new Nvidia control panel(even after installing stereo3d 169 nvidia drivers), but pushing Ctrl T does work and does activate stereo for me. In the system info bar of the new nvidia control panel there are a couple added .DLL files relating to stereo3d when you install the stereo drivers. I am using windows XP pro 32 bit, Dell Precision 690 Workstation with dual core Xeon.

With stereo off, game has fast frame rate in OpenGl mode and DirectX mode. Turning stereo on with CTRL T - In directx game is choppy (seems framerate is slow and lots of ghosting type effects) - which surprised me because Quadro FX 3500 is very high end card (only running at 800x600 per Z800 requirements). I am going to test newer games like oblivion in a week. When I put Half Life into OPENGL mode, game is no longer choppy, very smooth and 3d effect is very nice I think, but there is artifacting where it seems random textures pop in and out of the scene at random intervals. The choppiness of the directx is more aggravating than the artifacting of the OpenGL mode. I read about quad buffering and such things that should make 3dstereo on Quadro run very fast and outperform consumer grade cards, I don't know if these are turned on or not and being used in Half Life. Can anyone educate me why very fast, very high end Quadro 3500 card having problems with old game like Half life?

Really would like any info others can point me to for better education. I looked at stereo3d.com boards and nvidia forum boards and the boards here and having trouble finding lots of good easy info on Quadro, Z800, stereo3d information.

I am thinking maybe the hardware stereo abilities in the Quadro boards are not being turned on with the way I am configuring things and perhaps there is some registry tweaking that will give much better performance, perhaps it is just the older game, I am not sure.

I have read some threads at some boards you do not need the stereo3d nvidia driver installed because the regular Quadro drivers have native built in stereo support, yet if I uninstall the 169 level stereo3d drivers, CTRL T no longer works, and I can't make Half Life go into stereo3d mode - this confuses me.

[wuhlei]

linux drivers come with stereo support you should check it out.

[CarlKenner]

Quadro's advantage is that it lets OpenGL programs use the glDrawBuffer function to draw to the left eye or right eye. You need programs that use that function. There is a special section in control panel which lets you choose what kind of stereo to use for those programs.

That advantage comes purely from the driver. But the driver only works on a quadro card.

You can hack the firmware on some cards to turn them into a quadro.

[martinlandau]

Quadro's advantage is that it lets OpenGL programs use the glDrawBuffer function to draw to the left eye or right eye. You need programs that use that function. There is a special section in control panel which lets you choose what kind of stereo to use for those programs.

Thanks for the speedy reply.

Yes I have seen where I can choose what kind of Stereo. I am going to make a profile for the Hl.exe (half life) with all the options maxed, IE ansiotropic, FSAA, buffering etc etc - but I am not sure what all the options do and which settings will make the gameplay better/worse.

Perhaps I am not understanding, but shouldn't half life when run at 800x600 with my equipment be very smooth wether on directx or opengl? I was expecting very fluid movement in halflife with current hardware specs. The directx version is simply not playable to me, the Opengl version is, I am worried that games that don't have opengl will be unplayable, are my expectations too high? Are frame rates still this low and gameplay this choppy on modern hardware? If this is merely a driver issue and there is no hardware differences between a quadro and a geforce, then many people here are losing out, because the opengl version of half life on my hardware is much much better than the directx version. The difference between playable and not. What is the geforce equivalent of a quadro fx 3500, I can't fathom that nvidia is able to charge so much more for 2 indentical pieces of hardware, but one just has different drivers.

[LukePC1]

What is the geforce equivalent of a quadro fx 3500, I can't fathom that nvidia is able to charge so much more for 2 indentical pieces of hardware, but one just has different drivers.

FX 3500 G71GL (..)
Based on same core as the Quadro 5500, but with only 20 pixel, 7 vertex units, and 256 MB RAM.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quadro
If you look at 3500 you'll find that it's based on the G71 which should be the chip of a 7900gtx - at least that stands in the German wiki.
So the card should performe quite well for most programs and games.

I don't know about the quadro, but maybe you need the registry hack to get the old controll panel for some drivers?
You could try ot kindDragons tool for that (TuningNSD2.exe). It has a checkbox on the second page to get the old control panel - at least for normal gf cards.

[wuhlei]

Quadro's advantage is that it lets OpenGL programs use the glDrawBuffer function to draw to the left eye or right eye. You need programs that use that function. There is a special section in control panel which lets you choose what kind of stereo to use for those programs.

That advantage comes purely from the driver. But the driver only works on a quadro card.

You can hack the firmware on some cards to turn them into a quadro.

I think that only works for geforce 2,3,4 and stereo won't work on the new cards right? I think kind dragon posted that? I don't know. lol

yeah the prices are insane

[martinlandau]

I think that only works for geforce 2,3,4 and stereo won't work on the new cards right? I think kind dragon posted that? I don't know. lol

yeah the prices are insane

I tried Oblivion today, I could not find an option in the game to switch between opengl and directx like I could in Half Life, but it is much smoother than half life with either option and looks incredibly better. I must look into this kinddragon driver, for the 169 level drivers no longer have a stereo3d tab on the nvidia control panel even with the stereo drivers installed (but ctrl T does work to enable 3d). I am amazed that our purchasing department at work is buying these quadro's when they could save more than half the cost and buy geforce's and just do some driver/firmware trickery.