Settings for nVidia?

[Wes Macaulay]

So, this doesn't happen to your install of Revit then, Wes?

No, not now, and not ever! I've been really conservative with video cards for a while and every computer I get either gets tested beforehand to ensure complete compatibility, or I just buy ATI. I have to use the Omega drivers on one computer as Acer's drivers for the Radeon on the notebook didn't work with Revit.

[ws]

Fair enough - I'll get an Ati card and give it a go.

[Wes Macaulay]

See if you can get your hands on a ATI FireGL V3100 or other 3000 series model -- you don't need anything more than this modest card...

[ws]

thanks Wes...

looks like my graphic card supplier still has one on the shelf - price negotiable

I see looking at the May 2007 driver release notes for the unified v3100 driver it mentions Revit as being auto-recognised by the default driver setup - but whether it is looking for the Revit 8 that it was originally certified for only time will tell I guess.
https://a248.e.akamai.net/f/674/9206...8.353.1.1.html

[MRV]

I have the FireglV3100, and ran into problems with the current drivers. Go back one version and it works just fine (this is with Windows XP mind you). Also the V3100 has one digital and one analog (vga) connection on the back, if you are like me (dual lcd moniters) you might want to get a V3200 or better to get digital output for both. Windows Vista has been a real bust for me with ATI and Revit...

[ws]

thanks Michael,

I've realised that I'll probably need a slightly fancier card than the V3100 - the v3400 looks reasonable - to still run Nemetschek Allplan on the same PC - but I'm going to have a chat today to a specialist card supplier, not that I expect them to know anything about Revit from past experience.

[ws]

Ordered an Ati FireGL V3400 as the best compromise - it's on Nemetschek's certified driver list for Allplan as well as the likely advantages for Revit.

Incidentally, the graphics card specialist mentioned what I had already found out the hard way...
that latest Nvidia driver I mentioned in an earlier post, 91.85 is, in his words 'a pig' and like me he has gone back to 91.36

[tmomeyer]

Interesting recommendations to buy ATI FireGL cards. I did some checking and the V3100 (in US) is approx $159, V5100 is $500 and both are 128 mb. The V7100 is $640 and is 256 mb. Our reseller recommended a video card with 256 mb. Interesting... reports here that the V3000 series are performing OK with 128 mb.

Interesting... someone said that Accurender will be going away in Revit and the rendering engine from Viz/Max/AutoCAD put in... those have always played well with nVidia... does anyone know the time-frame for the change? I'm leaning towards buying nVidia FX 550 (128 mb) for approx $235 or FX 1200 (256 mb) for $600. Or, we could buy one GeForce 8500 GT (256 mb) $140 ... just to see if it would work.

So... I did some more checking on our nVidia FX 550 (128 mb) and FX 3450 (256 mb) computers and found that moving around zooming, panning, a 30- 35 mb Revit model worked nicely in shaded and hidden modes. There is a difference between the two, but would say - not knowing much about Revit, just evaluating our hardware if we were to switch - that either appears to be OK. Tried them with OpenGL and Overlay Planes turned on in Revit Settings, Options, Graphics. Turned off overlay planes, couldn't see any difference.

The nVidia GeForce cards in our office are a little older in the 5000 series and I can't seen to find any settings that make them work in an acceptable fashion moving around the model. The settings that I learned to tweak were: (1) in nVidia Control Panel, Troubleshooting, check to see that hardware acceleration is Full, (2) in Manage 3D Settings, Global Settings, turn arisotropic sample optimization Off, turn trilinear optimization Off, and vertical sync change from 3D app to Force off. If there are other settings I missed, maybe someone could enlighten me. With these settings, there were 'artifacts' left on the screen and poor performance (no better than default) when moving around the model.

PS, great forum!

[ws]

Umm, well - installed an Ati FireGL v3400 and while it works fine in Revit, performance in terms of dropping objects and lines seems identical to the Nvidia FX1500.

Zoomed out so that my busy 'stonework' hatch doesn't show on the external walls, rotation and moving the 3D view is fine.

But zoomed in so that the hatch shows and rotate the model, great chunks of the model disappear temporarily and get redrawn after moving or rotating.

I notice that there is not a Revit setting listed in the driver, but default seems fine - which is with overlay planes enabled.

It may be wishful thinking, but the display seems a bit crisper on the V3400 than the FX1500, albeit refreshes are a tiny bit slower. Maybe there is a bit of anti-aliasing going on?

Oh well - at least it works - good value for money card the V3400
If you compare the technical specs it is a big increase in performance over the v3100, v3200 and v3350.

[Wes Macaulay]

A couple of things:

• make sure the card is in fact manufactured by ATI so their drivers work for it; then download ATI's drivers from support.ati.com -- the latest drivers are 8.353.1 and they work great on our made-by-ATI cards. A card not made by ATI may not be fully compatible with the driver or Revit
• Even with OpenGL acceleration Revit may drop parts of a complex model when spinning it in a 3D view. But in plan, lines must always be displayed (unless you're so far zoomed out that hatches just show solid). If you hold down the Control key and the middle mouse button in a plan view and slowly move the mouse up and down. If you're at a certain zoom level (having stopped moving the mouse) and some lines are still missing, then the card or the driver isn't compatible. That's one of the acid tests.
• On many nVidia cards with OpenGL on, you zoom in a plan view to certain area, and half the lines are missing -- they just don't show up til you zoom in or out (and then other lines are missing, argh). Do the Control+mid mouse button+move mouse up and down slowly and you can watch lines dis/reappear in a plan view.

We've tested higher-end nVidia FX cards and they didn't seem to be any faster in 3D in Revit than the ATI cards; just like the high-end ATI cards weren't any faster than the V3100. But the nVidia cards (FX1500 and FX540) were awful in plan views for lines disappearing at certain zoom levels.