Summary And Conclusions
After careful evaluation of the benchmark results, we condlude that the ATI FirePro V8700 is just a hair faster in several categories than its predecessor, the V8600.
Looking at the big picture level, we don't see any sweeping or major performance improvements from this new hardware. Nevertheless, this latest ATI offering makes a very good showing against the Quadro FX 5600, our previous performance champion. Given all of these observations, the pricing on this card makes it a very good deal for the money, even though a lot of money is involved. By way of comparison, the recently released Nvidia Quadro FX 5800 goes for an astounding $3,150, and the FX 5600 at $2,700 isn't exactly cheap either.
That's why we can recommend the ATI FirePro V8700 as an ideal product for demanding all-around graphics professionals, without any doubts or hesitation whatsoever.
ATI also offers lesser models below the V8700 as well; these include the V5700, V3750, and V3700. Look them up in our current workstation graphics charts to see where they stand.
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Here is something I've always wondered. How does a workstation graphics card handle everyday gaming?
I imagine that its much more effective to purchase multiple gaming GPU's for preformance, but I still wonder.
Om another question, can you load the FirePro drivers for the Radeon, and if so how does it perform with workstation graphics then ??
Having given up on racing for the latest and greatest card for gaming a couple of years ago due to many disappointments and a firm conspiracy theory that game manufacturers are in cohoots with the graphics card industry in order to extract as much cash as they can out of the gaming populace, I’m no surprised to read now that Gaming cards are inferior to professional workstation cards.
However, I do also remember reading somewhere, also a couple of years ago that workstation cards could not handle game graphics!
Why doesn’t somebody just create a decent all round card instead of all this smoke and mirrors?
Firstly, thank you very much for finally putting some hard figures to the difference between the Pro and gaming cards - very interesting. Are these improvements also seen in more specialist and less common application (for example I use EASE acoustic simulation software for work) or are the massive performance gains only for applications where targeted optimisation has occured?
Secondly, I also would be really interested to know how these Pro cards handle gaming.
Guys, the reason for the discrepancies between the mainstream and enterprise adaptors is DRIVERS. Not because a HD4870 (which incidentally is a quarter of the price) is magically "more shit" than the FirePro. And to answer the other query; The FirePro may very well SUCK at gaming. Why? Re-read first sentence. The FirePro drivers are specifically optimised for their intended purpose, and there would be no or minimal attempt to maintain compatibility with, much less optimise performance for, any gaming. It might work, it might work great, it might not, it might not work at all; the driver programmers don't really care as its just not their job.
You only pay extra for the Driver enhancements, there is very little difference between the gaming and workstation cards. Both nVidia and Ati handicap the gaming/desktop drivers so that they can sell the Workstation card at a higher price.
Just goes to show how much performance is being kept from consumers, you spend and spend and all you get is a purposely crippled hardware. Makes you wonder why they even bothering making new cards when they don't even give the full speed of the existing cards.
Therefore would it be possible to flash a HD4870 with the firmware from a FirePro V8700 since it is possible to do so for say a Nvidia 8800GTX too a 8800Ultra (all that changes are the frequencies it tries to run at and its product identity). Therefore the drivers could be fooled into thinking its a pro card
.
Anybody with a HD4870 they are prepared to loose?... (should be fixable if it doesnt work)
Therefore would it be possible to flash a HD4870 with the firmware from a FirePro V8700 since it is possible to do so for say a Nvidia 8800GTX too a 8800Ultra (all that changes are the frequencies it tries to run at and its product identity). Therefore the drivers could be fooled into thinking its a pro card
.
Anybody with a HD4870 they are prepared to loose?... (should be fixable if it doesnt work)
Why do people keep on comparing the "Workstation" to the "Gaming" cards?
How about calling them by their *real* names, the cards with proper OpenGL support, and the cards with just DirectX/3D support...
The *real* pity in all of this is that some games and applications actually use OpenGL so that they can be cross platform, and then get nerfed by ATI/nVidia's drivers (or to be correct, lack of correct OpenGL drivers) for the "Gaming" cards.