benstat
  For a Windows app with no special GPU accelleration requirements, I would say you would be fine with either. I'm using ATI at the moment with no problems at all - in games or in Sonar.

Thanks for your input! My question is DOES X1 have 'special GPU acceleration requirements'? What's implied by Cakewalk new under-the-hood graphics engine improvements? They do mention taking advantage of the GPU.

Sven

Hi Sven,

If X! is using "CUDA" which is nvidias GPU hardware acceleration, I'd go nvidia. Personally I've had this 9800 GTX from nvidia and love it. GPU accelation in photoshop CS5 is out of this world.

I have the same GPU and the same query, so this thread is very interesting!

Looking at the other threads, in addition I think I'd need to upgrade my monitors to take advantage of this new release. At least one of them.

Scott Lee


Hi Sven,

If X! is using "CUDA" which is nvidias GPU hardware acceleration, I'd go nvidia. Personally I've had this 9800 GTX from nvidia and love it. GPU accelation in photoshop CS5 is out of this world.

Cuda is only for calculation assistance, which in PhotoShop shows up in the form of video encode/decode acceleration and FX rendering, not GUI stuff (if I recall correctly). Personally, Id like to see OpenCL adopted over CUDA. Oh well CUDA has been around for a bit longer.

SvenArne


That looks interesting (and cheap and fanless) djtrailmixxx. I should mention that I'm on XP32 (but of course, won't be forever).

Have the bakers said anything specific on how the new graphics engine interacts with GPUs and which ones they recommend?

The sluggishness I mentioned seems pretty much unrelated to CPU load and project size. I have an Intel Q8550 CPU and 4GB of RAM so I should be in the clear, spec-wise.

Sven

XP 32 will not take much advantage of the GPU display acceleration wise, not like an AERO gui will. I have not heard about any HW requirements for thier new GUI. I have a pretty modern system with an ATI 5870 (noisy lil bastard, but I game somtimes) and switching screensets seems to have some more lag than the old GUI views, but this may be improved. I think that with all of the code and GUI changes, they are still optimising. Its surprising howmuch a new codebase will muck up the works.

"Cuda is only for calculation assistance"

Yes, I know. I made a big post about CUDA and using the GPU for audio processing. What I was saying is, if X! goes down the line of GPU hardware processing support, an Nvdia card would be the way to go.

Scott Lee


"Cuda is only for calculation assistance"

Yes, I know. I made a big post about CUDA and using the GPU for audio processing. What I was saying is, if X! goes down the line of GPU hardware processing support, an Nvdia card would be the way to go.

Sure, it will be nice when all functions which can benifit from GPU acceleration do so.

While you don't need a high-end gamer card to run SONAR X1's new graphics engine, a reasonably new series card with a good amount of RAM (especially at high resolutions) will provide smoother graphics.

Anything from the AMD 3000, 4000, 5000, or 6000 series should be fine as would anything from the nVidia 8000, 9000, 100, 200, 300, or 400 series.

What I'd look for is a card with 1gig of RAM at least, no fan, and multiple digital outputs (DVI, HDMI, or Display Port).

There's lots of fanboi-ism in the gaming world when it comes to video cards, but in the DAW world the brand of the GPU really doesn't matter. It's all about finding the right card with the right specs at the right price.

If you happen to have a preference of either brand, that's fine, but one really won't perform better than the other.

And X1 does not use CUDA or any part of the GPU for audio processing. If you want modified graphics cards that process plugins then get some UAD cards. And then expect to deal with the downside of adding DSP cards to a native host, like latency.

Oh, and FWIW the cards I've got in my systems are 2 x AMD HD4350 1gig (fanless and dual DVI) and also 2 x nVidia 8600GS 1gig (fanless and dual DVI). They both run X1 exactly the same.

Thank you for this info, Seth! So you do believe that my old graphics card with little RAM is indeed the reason for the visual sluggishness even in XP32?

If so I'm off to get a new one! Hope this doesn't have the side-effect of me taking up gaming, though. I have enough distractions as it is...

Sven