I need a good GPU for doing complex After effects compositing, and editing in premiere CS3. No games. Ive heard that the Quadro cards are very overpriced for there performance so i'm wondering if i can get away with a 8800GT card. The 8800GT has OpenGL 2 and PCIe 2.0 and seems to be popular. so how would it stack up compared to a Quadro 1700 or a 3500 even?

I want to make sure me spending $500 more is worth it for a Quadro FX series?

The 8800GT will blow those two Quadro cards off the map. The ultra high-end Quadro4600 and 5600 are the only Quadro cards that will beat the 8800GT.

If you use an external monitor for previewing video in premiere, using Cineform or any other product requiring video overlay capabilities, make very certain the GT supports video overlay. The GTS does, via a workaround, on XP only, not on Vista. Lots of gripes about that have gone around.

Carl

Well, since i have a Blackmagic intensity card i am using the HDMI out from that for my video previewing in SD and HD. So I might not need video out - However ive been told that yes, you can make the GT have video overlay (output to video monitor from premiere timeline)

The 8800GT will blow those two Quadro cards off the map. The ultra high-end Quadro4600 and 5600 are the only Quadro cards that will beat the 8800GT.

I know I'm reviving this old thread. But I'd like to know more about this. So you're saying that the lower end Quadro cards perform slower than the off the shelf Geforce? Great news for me, since it costs less. However, the folks at nVidia are still trying to convince people otherwise.

Also, I was looking into getting a Quadro FX 1700/3700. Would a Geforce 9600/9800 perform similarly?

I could be wrong but I believe NVIDIA codes their card numbers so that the 600 has less features than the 800.

The 9000 series will no doubt be more powerful than the 8000's. However the performance on the 8800GT is excellent. A *very* good buy for the price. Probably the best deal out there right now (may08).