AMD OpenCL vs NVIDIA CUDA

[Geekazoid]

Hi guys,

A topic simular to this may have been started before however I didn't see it so I've chosen to start it.

Just want a non-bias opinion or rather a good knowledge of which is faster overal. My main purpose for asking this is for video rendering in Sony Vegas. Which do you guys find is better, rendering with an AMD GPU using OpenCL or rendering with NVIDIA using CUDA?

It would be good for people who have used both technologies and GPUs to get a real understanding of which is better.

Just to note: Saying AMD OpenCL FTW or NVIDIA CUDA FTW wont be helpful.

[Hazy125]

OpenCL has been proven to run faster than CUDA is cherry picked applications and settings. Right now, CUDA is better for rendering and has more support. But OpenCL is becoming better for rendering, over the next few years OpenCL may be better than CUDA

[ExDreamer]

GPU acceleration

Our expert team of developers and engineers have spent countless hours revamping the Vegas Pro application to give users increased speed and flexibility. We've made performance enhancements for OpenCL™-supported devices so that Vegas Pro 12 powers through a variety of supported video processes and rendering tasks with ease.

http://www.sonycreativesoftware.com/vegaspro/gpuacceleration

 

 

 

http://fireuser.com/blog/benchmarking_sony_vegas_pro_11_using_gpu_on_firepro_vs_quadro/

 

 

Sony Vegas™ Pro 11 Featuring OpenCL™ Enhances Performance with AMD Technologies

Sony Creative Software has been a great AMD technology partner for many years – and a pioneer in leveraging hardware innovations with Sony Vegas Pro to enable new levels of performance and capabilities. For example, Sony was among the first to offer native 64-bit support for AMD64 as well as optimizations to scale efficiently across multiple processor cores. AMD’s leadership in multicore x86 processors has made it a key technology partner to Sony over the years. Sony Vegas Pro has developed a large and loyal fan base that have come to count on Sony to provide an efficient, intuitive, and integrated content creation environment for video and broadcast professionals.

 

http://www.sonycreativesoftware.com/vegaspro/gpuacceleration

 

AMD and Adobe Show OpenCL Support for next version of Adobe Premiere Pro

 

This will be the first time that OpenCL is used as the primary rendering engine for Premiere and is something that AMD has been hoping to see for many years.  Previous versions of the software integrated support for NVIDIA's CUDA GPGPU programming models and the revolution of the Mercury Playback Engine was truly industry changing for video production.  However, because it was using CUDA, AMD users were left out of these performance improvements in favor of the proprietary NVIDIA software solution.

http://www.pcper.com/news/General-Tech/AMD-and-Adobe-Show-OpenCL-Support-next-version-Adobe-Premiere-Pro

 

Interesting read here

http://www.pcper.com/reviews/Editorial/Adobe-Creative-Cloud-CC-About-dAMD-Time

 

While Adobe still has several months of planning and production, the new Mac Pro from Apple contains a pair of high-end FirePro graphics processors. Apart from the same two mobility chips available for OpenCL acceleration with CS6, no other AMD-based graphics processor is supported for Mac OSX. It is possible that the new Mac Pro could launch without GPU support from Adobe, unless you run Windows on it if that is even possible.

 

Before we stray too far from the Mac, while OpenCL support is still negligible, Adobe has added CUDA to nine NVIDIA graphics processors. Support seems to run the gamut, from the GTX 285 all the way up to the Quadro K5000.

NVIDIA owners will also be disappointed to see cards below the GeForce GTX 680, except the mobile GTX 675MX, not supported with Mercury Playback Engine. Personally, I own a GTX 670, and indeed I am disappointed.

 

 

 

 

[SteepGnomeKing]

I have troubles believing anything from a company that says there product is better so those 2 graphs really do nothing for me as to which is better. Those are hand picked biased results. 

 

I don't know which is better atm but that part of the industry is changing so much right now it's hard to tell what the optimal set up will be in a few years once everything becomes supportive of opencl.

[Geekazoid]

Well all those graphs and visual presentations seem to favour AMD and OpenCL. I've seen benchmarks between the AMD Radeon HD 7870 and the new NVIDIA GTX 760 that show, when rendering in SVP 12, the 760 equal to the 7870. You'll see in my sig that I have selected the EVGA GeForce GTX 760. This is because:

1. I prefer the way NVIDIA does things, and

2. If the performance is equal to the 7870 then I might as well stick with the 760.

This may seem a tab stupid but NVIDIA cards just seem to look more aestheticly pleasing, whereas some AMD cards that I've have seen don't look that appealing to me. I realise this is stupid but when you're building a New PC you want everything to look decent including the GPU.

[TechFan@ic]

In the latest version of Sony Vegas, OpenCL is significantly faster than CUDA, in the latest version of the Adobe creative suite, OpenCL is also significantly faster than CUDA.

[EmmaLong]

In the latest version of Sony Vegas, OpenCL is significantly faster than CUDA, in the latest version of the Adobe creative suite, OpenCL is also significantly faster than CUDA.

+1, Logan from Tek Syndicate switched out his Nvidia card with an AMD card when OpenCL support came to Adobe CC, he says it's miles faster.

[Geekazoid]

Okay I realise that I'm not giving AMD a chance. How reliable are AMD GPUs, as in could it still be working fine 10 years from now, not that I would keep it that long but it's to get an idea of it's reliability. Also what brand should I go with?

 

The options are kind of limited but here:

 

http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=193_1372&zenid=1f0337f8672db0f3654170c3406171b6Okay

[TechFan@ic]

Okay I realise that I'm not giving AMD a chance. How reliable are AMD GPUs, as in could it still be working fine 10 years from now, not that I would keep it that long but it's to get an idea of it's reliability. Also what brand should I go with?

 

The options are kind of limited but here:

 

http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=193_1372&zenid=1f0337f8672db0f3654170c3406171b6Okay

I have a 9 year old X600 card that is still working to this day, my 5 year old 4870 is also still working fantastically well & even holding its overclock.

I had an 8800 GT that died within the first year, but I also have 9800 GTX that is still working to this day.

So Reliability is not an issue.

The two brands that you should avoid if you like to overclock are Gigabyte & XFX, these have locked voltages.

Sapphire & HIS are my two most favorite brands, decent pricing, great overclockability & reliability.

EDIT: If you currently have a 760 you should be looking into 7950s not 7870s.

[Geekazoid]

I have a 9 year old X600 card that is still working to this day, my 5 year old 4870 is also still working fantastically well & even holding its overclock.

I had an 8800 GT that died within the first year, but I also have 9800 GTX that is still working to this day.

So Reliability is not an issue.

The two brands that you should avoid if you like to overclock are Gigabyte & XFX, these have locked voltages.

Sapphire & HIS are my two most favorite brands, decent pricing, great overclockability & reliability.

EDIT: If you currently have a 760 you should be looking into 7950s not 7870s.

Oh! Well that's good about reliability. I kind of guessed that but I'd be looking at like roughly AU$40+ more to go with the 7950. I'm not sure that I want to step quite considerably over my budget. I might just add that everyone needs to keep in mind that I am coming from a GeForce GT 430 w/1GB of DDR3 vRAM.

[TechFan@ic]

Oh! Well that's good about reliability. I kind of guessed that but I'd be looking at like roughly AU$40+ more to go with the 7950. I'm not sure that I want to step quite considerably over my budget. I might just add that everyone needs to keep in mind that I am coming from a GeForce GT 430 w/1GB of DDR3 vRAM.

760s cost the same as 7950s.

http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=advanced_search_result&search_in_description=1&keyword=GTX+760&x=0&y=0

http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=24649&zenid=1f0337f8672db0f3654170c3406171b6Okay

Also keep in mind that a 7950 is significantly faster than a 7870 & a 760, you also get 3GB of VRAM instead of two, meaning the card will last you longer before you come across games that require more than 3GB.

The Tahiti GPUs (7950, 7970 & 7990) also have significantly more powerful FP64 performance than any 600/700 series card or any other 7000 series card, this translates into significantly better OpenCL & compute performance.

[Geekazoid]

760s cost the same as 7950s.

http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=advanced_search_result&search_in_description=1&keyword=GTX+760&x=0&y=0

http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=24649&zenid=1f0337f8672db0f3654170c3406171b6Okay

Hmm....I haven't heard great things about Powercolor. Would prefer to go with more well known brands or at least not Powercolor.

[TechFan@ic]

Hmm....I haven't heard great things about Powercolor. Would prefer to go with more well known brands or at least not Powercolor.

Nothing's wrong with Powercolor, they were the first to make a 7990 in fact, way before AMD even released the plans for it. They engineered the card from the ground up by themselves.

Their cards also have the quietest dual slot coolers out there & all of their cards have unlocked voltage control.

[TechFan@ic]

Also please remember that AMD has just cut the prices of the 7900 series, so you might need to wait for a week or so for these price cuts to take effect in Australia.
http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/44529-massive-amd-graphics-price-cuts-across-the-7900-series/#entry583998

[Geekazoid]

Also please remember that AMD has just cut the prices of the 7900 series, so you might need to wait for a week or so for these price cuts to take effect in Australia.

http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/44529-massive-amd-graphics-price-cuts-across-the-7900-series/#entry583998

Well that's interesting. It makes it tempting to go with an AMD GPU. Will have to definitely think about that. I wonder when the price cuts will take effect in my own country. Hopefully soon.

[Geekazoid]

I plan on purchasing my new build next month. So if these AMD price cuts come through well before then it will give me food for though.