Sprucing up the ol' PC for GPU action
 

After 6 months of distraction with many projects, I'm finally upgrading my aging Core i7 XPS Studio 435MT with a new monitor (HP 2311xi), faster memory (12GB), a new 600W PSU, and a video card that allows Vegas 11 Pro to use GPU acceleration. I got a ZOTAC GeForce GTX 650 card w/2GB memory, two DVI and two HDMI outputs. About $450 in all.

The XPS came with an ATI Radeon HD 4850 which actually worked quite well but bogs down with certain codecs and doesn't meet the GPU requirements of Vegas.

Re: Sprucing up the ol' PC for GPU action
 

OK (?) ..... Do you have a question?

Cheers

Grazie

Re: Sprucing up the ol' PC for GPU action
 

me thinks op's actually a statement.

rather hasty - i would have researched the perceived advantages of a 650 prior to buying one.

Re: Sprucing up the ol' PC for GPU action
 

I guess it was a statement, sometimes I get excited by progress.

Leslie, I chose the new graphics card with a price target in mind (around US$150), knowing it had to be compatible with Vegas's GPU requirements and two DVI connections. I read the owner reviews before buying. But I can't say I researched every option out there.

I'm always looking for good advice - if you kknow of a better option please share?

Re: Sprucing up the ol' PC for GPU action
 

Sam,

Did you perform a forum search regarding incompatibilities between the new Kepler GPUs and Vegas Pro 12's GPU acceleration feature? You see, the GTX 650 is part of the Kepler GPU loneup - but the repeated crashes in Vegas Pro 12 with GPU acceleration enabled with these newer GPUs has forced many Vegas users to semi-permanently lock the program to the CPU-only rendering mode (no GPU acceleration whatsoever).

And as I tried to state, even the latest release of Vegas Pro 12 does not properly support the newer Kepler GPUs. The most recent Nvidia GPU it supports for GPU acceleration is the now-obsolete GT(X) 5xx series.

Re: Sprucing up the ol' PC for GPU action
 

That information is very helpful - thanks!

I'm using Vegas 11 Pro on a Core i7 machine with PCI 2.0 architecture - but I'm guessing it makes little difference. I've been using CPU-only processing since I had Vegas 8 Pro. I wanted to purchase a card that would enable GPU processing - not cause crashes!

I'm a much better shooter/editor than I am a technician, so the world of NVIDIA, Radeon, GPU, CUDA, Keppler and all that stuff is hard to get my head around.

Again, your wisdom is greatly appreciated.

Re: Sprucing up the ol' PC for GPU action
 

Would something like this work?

EVGA 02G-P3-1568-RX GeForce GTX 560 Ti (Fermi) 2GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Support Video Card - Newegg.com

Re: Sprucing up the ol' PC for GPU action
 

Sam, on top of the other consideration, please be aware many of us find GPU accleration to be of limited or no value.

Among other things, it appears that for some of us Vegas users, that the amount the GPU feature helps is dependent on the relative speed of your processor, though evidence is anecdotal.

The short version of what I'm trying to say is to expect very little from your GPU, and you won't be disappointed. If it works better than expected you'll be happy. If it doesn't, you won't feel as badly.

Re: Sprucing up the ol' PC for GPU action
 

Thanks Jeff, I'm now thinking its better to invest in more RAM (or a new PC) than a video card and PSU.

Re: Sprucing up the ol' PC for GPU action
 

+ 1 jeff's comment.

i7/920 and 550ti - cpu is faster.

that said, i wouldn't even think about gpu until scs comes out with some software that's guaranteed to work with gpu - and not the hit and miss affair we have at the moment.

Re: Sprucing up the ol' PC for GPU action
 

It seems to me Sam that who the GPU thing helps is all over the place, we just don't know if it will help until we actually buy the card and try it. Many people it helps seem to be folks with slower processors but I've seen those with faster processors that liked it too.

In my case it is always better to turn it off, my performance suffers with the GPU enabled, but I do not have one of the better cards either. I personally feel money is better spent on a fast CPU.

As Leslie says so well, it is very hit and miss.