From ATI to Nvidia

[steve.70285]

I have been using ATI 9700 Radeon Pro and have had no problems with Revit, albeit I do not use GL acceleration since I've found little difference.

My problem is I can't use ATI with SketchUp...I really notice hardware acceleration here but the performance is poor. Something that @Last discusses in the hardware requirements.

After some research I've installed the Nvidia G-Force 6600 GT. The graphics are much improved on ShetchUp but Revit pretty much stayed the same. My drivers may not be correct for the new card since Revit sometimes shuts down when using OpenGL but the MSI drivers seem to roll back and I loose performance.

Can anyone tell me if,

1. I should see acceleration in Revit with either of these cards using OpenGL?
2. I would be better off using Nvidia FX type card for cad performance? I guess I was expecting a bigger difference in performance going to the 6600 on my PC from the ATI 9700Pro.

[Wes Macaulay]

You've got an MSI card? We have had problems with MSI cards and Revit. If you can, swap it out for another brand of nVidia card and see if that helps.

[muttlieb]

Wes, is there any particular brand of nVidia card you'd recommend?

[Wes Macaulay]

Oh sure - Asus and AOpen are two fine makes. We've also had good results with Gainward and Chaintech as well, which is to say - we haven't had any problems with these cards yet.

This is for those people who are buying aftermarket cards or are custom-building their own computers. Large computer mfrs like Dell and Compaq routinely provide their own drivers for nVidia cards which you need to use.

[steve.70285]

Thanks Wes,

As we talk I do not have the MSI video card, I have the MSI motherboard. The card is an e-geforce and I downloaded the new drivers from the manufacturer. Along with that I went into the bios and set agp settings to 256 (this I don't think this has much to do with Revit or SketchUp performance). I also downloaded Performance Test and found along with most categories my 2d and 3d graphic were running quite fast in comparison to benchmarks.

SketchUp is a much different program now...I can actually get something done on a large file.

As for Revit, I'm still working with the OpenGL off. I'm just not seeing much difference. It sounds as though this is quite common.

[muttlieb]

As for Revit, I'm still working with the OpenGL off. I'm just not seeing much difference. It sounds as though this is quite common.

I think the only time you'll see a difference is with shadows on. I've got an Asus GeForce FX 5200, with OpenGL off it takes about 7 seconds to regenerate shadows on a modest model. With OpenGL enabled it takes about 1-2 seconds.