Why Quadro?

jasong

New member
I’d like to try and explain what the benefits of workstation graphics cards are.

A workstation graphics card (i.e. an NVIDIA Quadro card, as found in the MSI WS/WT series) is a card optimized for specific tasks, such as CAD or other cases with demanding GPU simulations. Or, as NVIDIA itself puts it:

“The Quadro mobile workstation product family offers a complete range of graphics with unmatched performance and quality for the most demanding professionals on the go. From digital content creators on a movie set, to design engineers at a remote plant, to geo-scientists on an oil rig, mobile professionals bring Quadro graphics where their work is.”

So the target audience is clear – professionals. But what about the performance? As with everything else, it’s different from test to test, but in general, the properly specialized software, such as Catia, Maya and SolidWorks will make full use of a workstation card, and it’s these users who are the target audience of the MSI Workstation notebooks.

In any case, our findings show that even the entry level Quadro K2100M, as found in the WS60, will completely monster even the GTX 780M in all professional applications.
quadro.jpg
Granted, the result would be more or less the other way round in games, but for those serious about their work in animation, CAD and other demanding applications should consider a mobile Quadro to boost their productivity.

I will return to this topic in the future with updated tests, watch this space.
 
Quadro K2100M vs GTX 970M

Ever wondered why workstation graphics are so expensive? While it is true that regular gaming graphics are good enough for most people for home and recreational use, a proper workstation graphics solution will still kick the snot out of a solution that comes with much higher performance where it matters.

We lined up a WS60 with a Quadro K2100M and an i7-4710HQ CPU against a GE62 with GeForce GTX 970M graphics and a slightly faster i7-4720HQ CPU and decided to fire up a Siemens NX CAD benchmark. Not only did we get to see some nice car bodies and drive trains being rendered, but we also got a result with which we can prove our point, see below.

siemensnx.png

True, in gaming, the GE62 would be about as dominant as the WS60 is in this test, but still – workstation graphics work. Also, we ran this test out of curiousity ourselves, as you don’t see that many comparisons out there.
 
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