tvholicjames > 'I know rendering depends on the speed of the processor, then the amount of RAM. Quality of the output visual of the render requires a very very good video card. Am I right?'

Are you rendering in software or hardware? If its software, it shouldn't matter what graphics card you use, as long as you make your scene look pretty.


tvholicjames > 'I have a $200 ATI FireGL V3300, Intel Core 2 Duo, 4 Gigs of RAM, Intel Motherboard DG965SS.

When the render came out with 90% skin shaders on dense geometries. It didn't read all the updated high number values of the translucencies and the visual is not as saturated as the Nvidia Quadro 4600 that the school is using.

Does that mean I need a new video card? I have read from the Autodesk discussions, that ATI cards are known to have problems when rendering with Mental Ray and Nvidia Geoforce is only for games.'

I haven't checked the V3300's specs but I assume its probably just a standard Radeon with a FireGL sticker on it due to its price. Video card companies have been known to use standard chips, stick them on a card with workstation grade components and then call it high end (even though it isn't).

As for ATI cards having problems with Mental Ray, are they talking about the Radeons or the FireGLs? FireGLs are qualified by Autodesk for use with Maya so they should work without any problems.


tvholicjames > 'For the SLi cards, do I have to get 2 of the same video cards instead of 1?'

For SLI, you must use two exactly identical cards.