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grphics card for after effects CS6

orph

orph

macrumors 68000
Original poster
Dec 12, 2005
1,884
393
UK
hay I just got a macpro 3.1 (osx10.7.5 at the mo but happy to upgrade if needed) and I want advice on what GPU to buy for use with video apps.

I know final cut 7 makes almost no use of GPU so it's not a thing there.

Im looking at learning adobe After effects CS6 and maybe Adobe premiere Cs6, at first I had the idea/impression I needed a nvidia card for use with AE Cs6 but after a looking at the Adobe help site im slightly confused.
Adobe premiere = CUDA (for somethings not all)
After effects = any GPU? open GL/CL (with 1GB of ram or more)

Ill also be having a go at the motion which i assume is ok with any card?

i was looking at the nvidia GTX 550 TI (as it's on sale at the mo) or the GTX640/650 (leaning towards the GTX 640 as it's cheaper) but id be happy to look at ATI cards if you think there a valid option.

and is vRAM important once you get past 1GB (for some one staring out/learning)?

info on openCL use in premiere
http://blogs.adobe.com/premierepro/2012/05/opencl-and-premiere-pro-cs6.html
only;
"
Fast Blur effect
Gaussian Blur effect
Directional Blur effect
Basic 3D effect
"
cant be done in openCL and are left to the CPU the rest can be done on openCL it seems but are done with a CUDA card (tho dont know if CUDA vs openCL will give a big speed change).

info on After effects
http://blogs.adobe.com/premierepro/2011/02/cuda-mercury-playback-engine-and-adobe-premiere-pro.html
'Only the ray-traced 3D renderer in After Effects CS6 uses CUDA (as do a few third-party plug-ins).'
 
A

adamneer

macrumors 6502
Apr 18, 2013
420
747
Chicago, IL
Although there is talk of Adobe working in GPU support in the somewhat near future for ATI cards, mostly due to the next Mac Pro's switching solely to these cards, currently, Nvidia is the only card that will offer GPU acceleration. And it has to be a relatively recent card with enough CUDA cores to work (Adobe lists all the cards that support it on their website). From what I have heard, CUDA acceleration is like switching from a 5400rpm hard drive to an SSD in terms of performance boost. My next computer will undoubtedly have an Nvidia card because of this. I've actually been very much eyeing the current gen 27" iMac in the refurbished section of the Apple store, as it has an Nvidia GPU with 1g vram. (with anything RAM, the more the better, always) Also, CUDA relies on vram for some of its function (i don't actually know how CUDA works, but all I know is that Adobe's main specifications for GPU support is either a minimum 750mb or 1gb of vram (pretty sure its 1gb)).

In any case, why would you want to potentially miss out on a core feature of Adobe software that you pay for, regardless of whether or not you can utilize it? After Effects costs the same whether your computer supports CUDA or not.
 
orph

orph

macrumors 68000
Original poster
Dec 12, 2005
1,884
393
UK
yep Cs6 requires 1GB of vRAM + i think it;s something to do with screen resolution x something = video ram needed.

looks like AE dose not require CUDA for most things it uses openGL/CL its just those 4 effects and some 3rd party effects that actually use CUDA.
well thats what the text on the site says for CS6.


premier Cs6 will use openCL too with the Mercury Playback Engine http://blogs.adobe.com/premierepro/2011/02/cuda-mercury-playback-engine-and-adobe-premiere-pro.html
and list of supported (seems to be for premiere pro cc but the links from the CS6 page) GPU's http://www.adobe.com/products/premiere/tech-specs.html
lots of ATI card are A-ok

(Mercury Playback Engine is not used in AE Cs6 according to the site)
 
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