To GUI or not to GUI?

What's the latest on the need and desirability of a dedicated graphics card for the GUI? The configuration guides drop more of the language about the need for a separate GUI card, but still mention GUI-only cards.

We're getting a modded-ROM GTX980 for our Mac Pro so we could keep it running alongside our GT120 GUI card, or take that little ole fella out and make more room for other accessories like a USB3.0 card... or ventilation. And in general, it would be good to know for future builds.

Your thoughts?

[Rohit Gupta]

What's the latest on the need and desirability of a dedicated graphics card for the GUI? The configuration guides drop more of the language about the need for a separate GUI card, but still mention GUI-only cards.

We're getting a modded-ROM GTX980 for our Mac Pro so we could keep it running alongside our GT120 GUI card, or take that little ole fella out and make more room for other accessories like a USB3.0 card... or ventilation. And in general, it would be good to know for future builds.

Your thoughts?

The GT120 is really going to affect your GUI performance, especially during editing. Please get rid of it as soon as you can.

The GT120 is really going to affect your GUI performance, especially during editing. Please get rid of it as soon as you can.

Rohit, this sparks off a question from me. I am on Mac Pro 5.1 8-core with Titan and Quadro 4000 (GUI only). Can I continue with this configuration after I upgrade to Yosemite and R12?

The GT120 is really going to affect your GUI performance, especially during editing. Please get rid of it as soon as you can.

So having an OEM dedicated GUI card may have a detrimental effect on Resolve performance? It used to be the exact opposite - where was I supposed to hear or learn about this important change? I was going off what used to be a valid configuration 2 years ago (when Resolve gave a warning if you didn't have a dedicated GUI).

I gave the configuration guides yet another read, and there's absolutely no recommendation for or against a dedicated GUI card - just a discussion of the usefulness of different cards as GUI/GPU and discretionary options with or without a dedicated GUI card. After more digging, I finally found this bit by Peter Chamberlain (in a thread aptly named GTX 570 + GT120 - Best Option?) saying "While the GT120 is valuable... for new configs, I recommend considering alternatives".

Please update the configuration guide! I would appreciate clearer language about avoiding weak GUI cards in favor of combined GPU+GUI duty, as well as a discussion of this new bottleneck of interface rendering. It's at least as relevant as the guide's warnings against other old components (compute GPUs with 1GB of VRAM, for example).

We have one configuration with the GT120 for GUI and a stronger one for computation. It didn't become slower than in version 11, but of course it's quite an outdated card. So, i'd just expect a snappier GUI with something modern.
OTOH, I can still see slightly better performance with a dedicated computing card (or several, if you are using Studio). But the recent versions of Resolve, maybe even from version 10, already got better when using just one GPU for GUI and computation, like in an iMac. While GPUs got more powerful in those two years as well, I think BM has optimized code to a point where the difference between having a dedicated GUI or not is shrinking.

Just my two cents…

I did some fairly extensive testing, and really it seems you are better off dropping the GUI card, the performance increase is minimal in having one fitted, and in cases where it is an outdated card, the GUI performance is considerably worse, so there is little reason to have one these days IMHO.

I did some fairly extensive testing, and really it seems you are better off dropping the GUI card, the performance increase is minimal in having one fitted, and in cases where it is an outdated card, the GUI performance is considerably worse, so there is little reason to have one these days IMHO.

1. Which are the outdated cards on OSX?
2. I need the Mac boot screen, otherwise I feel uncomfortable. The new powerful NVDIA cards cannot give me that. So what are the options?
3. Running R11 with Quadro 4000 (GUI only) and Titan (GPU). Is my configuration fine?
4. I have noticed ticking the checkbox "use GUI GPU for computing" results in a drop in performance. Why is that?

We are running flashed 980Ti cards and get the Mac boot screen. We also have a flashed Titan card in another machine.

Re, point #4, Do not tick the box to use your underpowered GUI card for compute, that limits your Titan to only use the same amount of RAM as your GUI card.

2. I need the Mac boot screen, otherwise I feel uncomfortable. The new powerful NVDIA cards cannot give me that. So what are the options?

Get your existing Nvidia card flashed, e.g. If you have a Titan X:

http://www.macvidcards.com/store/p44/Nv ... 12_GB.html