ATI x1600 w/512 mb won't display realview graphics

[cdennyb]

Is there anything that can be adjusted or tweaked on my ATI X1600 card to allow it to display the realview graphics?
It's twice the card that the lowest version of the Fire GL is and you'd think it'd be fine to show anything SW has to throw at it.
I hate to sell my x1600 for $200 and buy a $90 Fire GL to just see realview graphics. LoL

thanks in advance
db

 

[ctopher]

I don't see the X1600 listed as an approved card.

Chris
Systems Analyst, I.S.
SolidWorks 06 4.1/PDMWorks 06
AutoCAD 06
ctopher's home (updated 06-21-06)

 

[cdennyb]

I realize it isn't listed as an "approved card" but so what... there's a hundred high end 'gamer cards' that walk all over these so-called approved certified video cards but come on now, is it really a propriatary thing between ATI and SW or is this realview something that's specific to those chipset cards? I don't understand what the Fire GL (cheaper version) that shows RVG and my sort of high end game card. Just curious mostly, since I hate to unload this nice card for a cheaper one just to see the realview.

 

[Theophilus]

From what I understand, there's quite a difference in gaming-optimized cards vs. CAD-optimized cards. So brute strength doesn't necessarily work in switching respective roles. (Something like a trade between frame rates and polygons able to be displayed.)

One thing is certain--if your card isn't approved by SW, you're on your own. This is the most important stumbling block to remove in attempting to use SW on your computer.

Jeff Mowry

http://www.industrialdesignhaus.com

Reason trumps all. And awe trumps reason.

 

[ctopher]

I agree. Gaming and CAD is not the same. You can find very good cards that are approved for SW and work very well for gaming, but sometimes not the other way.

Chris
Systems Analyst, I.S.
SolidWorks 06 4.1/PDMWorks 06
AutoCAD 06
ctopher's home (updated 06-21-06)

 

[bvanhiel]

The difference between gamer cards and CAD cards is not about power. The cards usually share the same PCB and GPU. The difference is in the drivers and the desire for marketing to differentiate the products. You have to pay more for a CAD card because they know that you'll pay it.

In practical terms the gamer drivers tend to optimize one window, and CAD drivers can handle multiple windows.

There are workarounds (hacks) for some cards. Do some google searching and you'll find some how-to's.

-b

 

[cdennyb]

Hey, thanks a bunch bvanheil. I understand a little more than I did. It's all about the money huh?

 

[CorBlimeyLimey]

How can it be "all about the money" if a $90 Fire GL card will show RVG, yet a $200 dollar X1600 won't?


Helpful SW websites FAQ559-520
How to get answers to your SW questions FAQ559-1091

 

[bvanhiel]

quote]
How can it be "all about the money" if a $90 Fire GL card will show RVG, yet a $200 dollar X1600 won't?
[/quote]

Because the equivilent CAD card to the x1600 is the FireGL V5200, which is a $600+ card. For $90 all you'll get is a 3100V (maybe) which has 1/4 the memory and much less speed.

The gamer and CAD versions of the card are physically almost identical. What your paying for is the privlidge of running the CAD drivers.

-b

 

[Theophilus]

Life's not normally quite as simple as it seems on the surface.

I think this RealView feature parallels this. Sure, you have to have the right drivers for everything to work properly, but that's a bit close to saying you have to have the right software to model complex geometry (such as SolidWorks), which is really too obvious to be worth saying.

Yeah, I imagine the CAD cards make a decent margin for the video companies, but they'll need to do so. The reason is not just that CAD people will pay it, but that the CAD market is considerably smaller, per card, than the gaming market. So custom drivers must be written to make everything work, but for a smaller (CAD) market--which gets into what it costs to reliably support a given feature like RealView.

I was champing at the bit to try out RealView when it came out, but I really don't ever use the feature now, since I often assign materials only in PhotoWorks, and not in the Materials Manager.

Jeff Mowry

http://www.industrialdesignhaus.com

Reason trumps all. And awe trumps reason.

 

[ctopher]

Jeff,
I agree 100%. I also don't use realview much either, unless I want to show off some "pretty" quickly to a manager walking by.

Chris
Systems Analyst, I.S.
SolidWorks 06 4.1/PDMWorks 06
AutoCAD 06
ctopher's home (updated 06-21-06)

 

[keepinitcool]

In various ways it is about the fact that the market can afford to pay for the increase. But that also means people who buy these CAD specific products are expecting business/commercial level drivers and technical support. ATI has dedicated toll free technical support and email for FireGL products.

Since these are for running a business the users will expect that the products actually work. If the game card has some visual artifacts, they will eventually get around to fixing them, but it's not going to be a priority to be done ASAP.

Of course, as mentioned, the market is smaller and yet there is still a lot of testing to verify funcationality with Solidworks, ProE, Catia, Solid Edge, etc... That's a lot of work for a lower volume product.

 

[bvanhiel]

Economics 101. When a seller has scarcity power, then prices are set by the what the customer is willing to pay. Prices don't have anything to do with the cost of providing the goods/service.

CAD users will pay big $$$ for cards that are stable, because they are using them to make money and can justify the increased expense with increased reliability. Hence the large $$$.

If for some reason CAD users were more price sensitive than gamers, then the CAD cards would actually cost less than the gamer equivilent.

It's not a moral judgement about money grubbing corporations. It's an economic reality of the capitalist system. Gravity isn't mean just because it makes you fall down.

-b

 

[StefanHamminga]

For those of you who want to have some numbers on just how many quadro cards are sold compared to gaming cards:

http://media.corporate-ir.net/media_files/irol/11/116466/reports/NVDA_Form10-K_FY2006.pdf

Read on from page 43

GPU Business. GPU Business revenue increased by 22.6% to $1.7 billion for fiscal 2006 compared to $1.4
billion for fiscal 2005. The increase was the result of increased sales of our GeForce 6 and GeForce 7 families of desktop GPUs that serve the high-end GPU segment, offset by a slight decline in sales of our mainstream GPU
products. In addition, sales of our NVIDIA Quadro professional workstation products and notebook products
continued to improve due to an increased mix of GeForce 6-based and GeForce 7-based products, which resulted
in an increase in average selling prices.

GPU Business. The gross margin of our GPU Business increased during fiscal 2006 as compared to fiscal
2005, primarily due to the sale of our GeForce 7 series GPUs and increased sales of our GeForce 6 series GPUs,
which collectively now account for approximately 78% of our GPU Business revenue. Our GeForce 7 and our
GeForce 6 series GPUs generally have higher gross margins than our GeForce FX series GPUs which comprised
53% of our fiscal 2005 GPU Business revenue. In addition, average selling prices from our notebook GeForce 7
and GeForce 6 series GPU products increased as a larger percentage of our total notebook revenue during fiscal
2006 as compared to fiscal 2005.

You could conclude from the last quote that the quadro revenues can not be larger than 22% and are probably much lower. Combining that with the much higher margins on Quadro products shows how small the market for professional GPUs actually is.

Stefan Hamminga
EngIT Solutions
CSWP/Mechanical designer/AI student

 

[Theophilus]

My point was that it's not merely "scarcity power" driving the prices, since competition eliminates (or drastically reduces) any such power. Since entry barriers to this market would be relatively low to companies already producing similar products, I'd estimate there's not much power to be had.

If we were talking selling the only source of water for a small town (such as the lake behind the dam), then we'd be talking about a big influence of such power.

As it is in the tech sector, captitalism is actually generating goods from "nothing"--truly making money instead of merely redistributing it, as Marx's fans would have us understand economics. Certainly, they can charge what the market will bear, but fat margins attracts a great deal of attention from potential competitors who will gladly help themselves to a piece of the pie with a similar product. (I do this myself all the time, pitting my skills and prices against other design firms. And I do it with a twist on the "traditional" design studio that gives me an excellent competitive edge.) Without profit as a goal, we'd have no advanced CAD cards whatsoever.

In fact, we'd have very little.

Jeff Mowry

http://www.industrialdesignhaus.com

Reason trumps all. And awe trumps reason.

 

[bvanhiel]

Price discrimination
Where a monopoly exists, the price of a product is likely to be higher than in a competitive market and the quantity sold less, generating monopoly profits for the seller. These profits can be increased further if the market can be segmented with different prices charged to different segments (referred to as price discrimination), charging higher prices to those segments willing and able to pay more and charging less to those whose demand is price elastic. The price discriminator might need to create rate fences that will prevent members of a higher price segment from purchasing at the prices available to members of a lower price segment. This behaviour is rational on the part of the monopolist, but is often seen by competition authorities as an abuse of a monopoly position, whether or not the monopoly itself is sanctioned.

While there is not a monopoly, I don't think there is too much competition. If there was stiff competition in the CAD market, one would expect the price difference between a CAD and gamer card to be close to the amortized cost of driver development.

I would argue that there is not much competition, and that the barriers to entry are significant. In addition to IP issues, the low-mid level CAD market relies on the gamer market to fund most of the up front costs. Thus the only serious competitors in the CAD market are those that are successful in the much larger gamer market.

As I said before, I'm not making a moral judgement about corporate profit. It's just how capitalism works.

-b

 

[Theophilus]

Good points, especially with the link between successful CAD card manufacturers and gaming card manufacturers. So with that mix required for success (or greatly aiding success), the entry barriers would significantly higher, even for those within the industry.

Jeff Mowry

http://www.industrialdesignhaus.com

Reason trumps all. And awe trumps reason.