AMD/ATI FirePro v7800/v7900 & VP 11, any good?

ReceptorDeceptor wrote on 5/13/2012, 10:56 AM
Hi everyone!

I'm currently working on a large-scale video project with Vegas 11 Pro and I've been thinking of ways to boost out my workstation, which is already pretty much maxed out in terms of the CPU, disk drives, memory etc. The next logical step would be to get some extra punch from the GPU side.

Sony has been advertising the new GPU acceleration features in VP11 recently, especially by underlining the performance of the new AMD/ATI FirePro graphics cards -- some of the new FirePro cards are advertised to get you 5-10x faster render/preview times compared to a computer setup that's otherwise the same but without GPU acceleration.

My current video card (ATI Radeon HD5450) doesn't support GPU acceleration in Sony Vegas Pro 11. The FirePro model I've been looking as a potential candidate to purchase is either the V7800 or the V7900 model, both of which have been advertised specifically to be used with Sony Vegas 11 Pro.

Before I make any decisions, I'd like to ask if anyone has any experience on these cards? I'd like to know that are there any significant advantages gained from these cards or using GPU acceleration altogether? In VP10, the GPU acceleration was pretty much a joke - I couldn't get it to work even in my Sony VAIO i7 laptop which has a NVidia CUDA graphics card in it (and was advertised by Sony to be their top-model for video editing).

The projects I'm working with tend to get quite heavy, considering the amount of post-processing I need to do on a regular basis (such as color correction, masking, video automation etc), so I'd be happy to boost up the performance in any possible way. Thanks in advance!

Comments

royfphoto wrote on 5/14/2012, 5:40 AM
I'm sure it would help but before you buy a video card consider that programs like Premiere and (free) resolve insist on Nvida. More importantly be sure the power supply you have can support the new card.
imaginACTION_films wrote on 5/15/2012, 12:28 AM
If you're doing large complex projects I would urge you to check out numerous threads on this forum that show serious issues with GPU acceleration with VP 11.
I have build 683 64-bit and a Radeon 6950 HD 2GB graphics card. I am unable to render from HDV to mp4 at all with GPU acceleration enabled, although with GPU disabled the renders work well.

There are so many issues with VP11 at the moment that I'm staying with VP10e for complex paying projects. This is working reliably and very fast (check out my system specs). For example I get rendering in about 1/6th real time in simple projects and recently had a 10 minute project with 40+ video tracks that rendered in about half an hour, ie 3x real time.

Making the step up recently from 8GB to 16GB RAM made a noticable improvement in playback performance. I now get HDV files playing easily at 25fps at Best quality. I'm also able to work with 32-bit floating point and Best video rendering quality.
Caution is the watchword till VP11 is really sorted!
David
ushere wrote on 5/15/2012, 2:48 AM
I now get HDV files playing easily at 25fps at Best quality.

i get that with a i7/920 and 12gb ram? surely you didn't have problems prior to your upgrade? avchd might be another matter.
NicolSD wrote on 5/15/2012, 8:52 AM
I have tried VP11 with 4 different cards: Radeon HD5770, Radeon HD7970, NVidia GTX570 and Nvidia GTX580. The NVidia cards always worked flawlessly. The AMD cards were nothing but trouble. I don't know if a Firepro model would be any different. But I wouldn't even try it. The NVidia cards work across many platforms and their implementation is solid.

So my suggestion is to stick with what works.
Steve Mann wrote on 5/15/2012, 10:39 AM
I have never been happy with Radeon drivers and will never buy another one.

Remember that the advertised specs are aimed at the gaming world and have no relationship to what video editors call rendering.

nVidia also makes high-end graphics processors for the likes of NASA and AutoCAD workstations. (Those boards run about $4,000.) I have never seen ATI/Radeon in that world.
NicolSD wrote on 5/15/2012, 12:58 PM
Although NVidia has not been much in terms of bringing to market new video cards for work stations in quite a while, they have come up with a way to use both a Quadro and a Tesla at the same time. They call that a Magnus configuration. It is supposed to blow everything away when it comes to rendering.
TheHappyFriar wrote on 5/15/2012, 1:18 PM
nVidia also makes high-end graphics processors for the likes of NASA and AutoCAD workstations. (Those boards run about $4,000.) I have never seen ATI/Radeon in that world.

That's the FirePro/FireGL line.

It wasn't very hard to find, just looked under "workstation" instead of "desktop" (they've had them longer then Nvidia has). AMD's support 4 monitors out of the box, DX11 & OGL 4.2. The ATI's support 6 monitors, DX11 & OGL 4.0. I'm all more for more monitors vs lower-quality GPU rendering (can't wait until I can get a touch screen & Win7).