Test Drive: Nvidia Quadro CX and Adobe CS4, Part 2

DCP By Jan Ozer
This month, we're looking at how Nvidia's Quadro CX technology (around $2,000 at Videoguys) can accelerate performance in Adobe Creative Suite 4 (CS4). In the first installment, we learned about why having a powerful graphics card wasn't all that important to previous versions of the Adobe Create Suite, and how CS4's embracing of OpenGL makes graphics performance important again. However, we also saw that Adobe had certified Nvidia's GeForce GTX 260 for use with After Effects and Photoshop, and that this $300 card costs a fraction of the Quadro CX's retail price tag. So is the Quadro CX worth the significant investment and why?

I looked at three applications—Photoshop, After Effects, and Premiere Pro—to answer that question, running comparative tests that I'll detail below. Basically, when considering this card, it comes to two aspects: capacity and performance. read more...