Whats the deal with geforce fx

[rhettdec]

is this card going to be good for 3d? how will rendering be? is it mainly for gaming or what? whats the scoop and when is it coming out?

[mnhan32]

Its coming out Jan/Feb in the US according to the latest information.

There are TONS of reviews/faqs/specs all over on the card, and even some on nvidia's site. I suggest you check those out.

Logically it should be quite good for 3d and is be touted as more then a gamer's card. Of course the later Quadro based on the same technology will be the big professional card. The FX does have the native Cg langauge and everything and some apps, like XSI, will be fully integrated into that while others (Max, Maya) will have plugins.

I'm personally planning on getting that card myself as I think it will have good 3d app performance and will kick ass for other things too

Check the Launch video off of nvidia's site for lots of interesting stuff to see.

[rhettdec]

so the quadro cards are nvidias professional offering? how much do those run? you mentioned apps for the fx card, what kind of apps do video cards have? god too much to learn. is there a book i could get to learn all this stuff, like a 3d artists hardware handbook or something?

[mnhan32]

The Quadro cards have been the "professional" cards from nvidia. The Geforce cards are considered the "gamers" cards. In the past Quadro cards have been $200-1000 more then the Geforce card (there are [and prolly will be still] different levels of Quadro cards which effect the price).

Well any program that can take advantage of the Video Card's hardware will not load down your CPU(s) in your machine. Thats a big deal for developers of course. The new programming langauge for procedural textures and such, called Cg, is one of the big things now a days it seems. Check out the gobs of articles on that at nvidia's site. XSI is going to be the first 3d app to ship w/ that Cg stuff integrated. Already there are plugins out for Maya and Max. Chances are you probably won't be doing that unless you are doing more developer stuff (at least in the relatively near future).

Sadly I don't know of any book ... maybe one of the other gurus on this board will have a suggestion of one. All I can say is read all you can on the net about the card you are interested in and that will most likely send you down different paths anyhow to learn more about it. Check out some of the other posts about the NV30 in this section, that is what the Geforce FX card has been named (prior to two weeks ago or so). Definately the posts in this section will give you some background knowledge that can help you make your decisions down the road. Besides you have two months till the Geforce FX card comes out anyhow

[rhettdec]

ok cool, thanks for the input.

[daanbanaan]

i am a bit confused, will my viewports look like renders?...or is there some sort of preview window that comes up?

on another note....is the cg language something that will be worth learning for the industry?