So my head's in a scramble right now.. Gaming... or Workstation....

I orignally wanted Radeon 5870 since the thing is it's cheaper and it's a really good gaming card.

On the other hand... I really wanted to get a Quadro for workstation. The thing is those things are pricey. I was thinking of going for a Quadro FX1800 just for starters then I'm thinking the gaming side goes crap.

Question:

Do Nvidia gaming cards perform better than ATI gaming cards on stuffs like Video Editing, Photoshop(or any other stuffs in the same category) because of CUDA cores? 

Since I'm starting out I'd be willing to sacrifice workstation side. But I'm not doing the same for gaming. :)

So I'm trying to find the correct balance here. I would be really happy if the Photoshop OpenGL mode works smoothly while having an awesome gaming rig.

Not 3D stuffs in photoshop but just fairly large scale works. On my pc right now it bothers me when the brush is sometimes delayed.... And I hate that kinda distraction.

The answer is no, with caveats.

Nvidia and AMD's architecture have roughly equal potential if developers optimise for the hardware. However, Nvidia has been the force pouring money into GPGPU tools, software and projects. The effect of this is that most GPGPU products are made with Nvidia tools and hardware and with CUDA in mind. If they support AMD at all it is as an afterthought.

Nvidia's hardware is also easier to make reach its potential. Fermi has local caches, better support for high-level languages, and a simpler execution pipeline (AMD has 5 units per cluster, Nvidia has 1, so unoptimised software on AMD may not use all 5 units).

Also, CUDA will die in favour of cross-platform solutions; DirectCompute and OpenCL. Without huge subsidy by Nvidia, no one would tie themselves to a single-vendor protocol like CUDA. As the money has dried up as AMD began to 'win' in the consumer graphics space, we will see more projects shift to OpenCL and therefore not favour Nvidia any more. In 1-2 years I expect all new GPGPU apps to perform equally well on both, or even favour AMD if they continue to have better performing GPUs as now.

But:

Current apps, even Photoshop, are Nvidia optimised. You will get better GPGPU performance from Nvidia right now for most apps.

There is a problem though. Nvidia's Fermi GPUs are crippled in DP performance to a quarter of their potential. The Tesla or Quadro GPUs with full compute capability are not yet launched and will have specs inferior to the GTX470 (GTX480: 1400MHz,480 shaders, 215W; GTX470: 1200MHz, 448 shaders, Tesla: 1150MHz, 448 shaders, 249W).

The Tesla should perform less than a 5850 in gaming apps, and use far more power, and AMD/Nvidia's professional graphics card drivers do indeed have much lower gaming performance than their desktop cards (in return for higher workstation app performance).

So:

For gaming, buy a 5870 like you were going to.

For workstation apps (rendering), buy an AMD FirePro [tend to be better value than Quadro, and Nvidia has yet to produce Fermi Quadros].

For GPGPU apps (Photoshop), buy a Quadro/Tesla.

Seems you need three cards, not one.

Ouch...

Looks like I'd be limping here. So... 5870 it is... Right now I'm running on a lowly 9400GT. And Photoshop runs like crap on OpenGL mode.

Do you think there will be a slight improvement of some sort?

Another question though is it recommendable to get dual GPU over a single GPU?

Forget the marketing crap the guy wrote above. A 5870 is probably two orders of magnitude faster than your 9400GT which is really the bottom end of graphic cards nowadays. Photoshop is a "static" program (you basically draw/change a picture, so all the gaming hype specs don't count). Unless you are really, really deep into graphics design, an 5870-type graphics card has more than enough power.

Yea it's tough, those cares are really expensive. However, the new feature of Premiere CS5 is using Nvidia cards. The Youtube video below shows what could be done, but the Quadro fx 4800 card he's using costs over $1,000.

Here's a list of cards that are supported for doing this. I've read that Nvidia's new GPU's (ie - the GTX 480) would probably be supported later on in the year.

For Photoshop, I don't know if or how much the workstation cards will make a difference. At work or school, they use Macs so the GPU's in those are very weak compared to something like the Radeon 5870.

What was wrong with it? Who was I marketing for?

There's very little hard data on the internet comparing Nvidia to AMD in Photoshop, but I believe Nvidia cards are much, much faster. Maybe even the 9400GT > 5870. Obviously the 5870 is many times faster in games, but I've already said Photoshop was Nvidia-biased.

On video encoding, Nvidia wins, because AMD's software is poor (their hardware is fine):

http://www.anandtech.com/show/2781

On 3D rendering, AMD wins on price/performance with the DX11 FirePro cards.

http://www.3dprofessor.org/Reviews%20Folder%20Pages/V8800/V8800P0.htm

On gaming, AMD cards are much better value at the moment, and Nvidia has a heat/noise problem with theirs - assuming you can even find one at a sensible price.

Before you go nutty and get a 400 dollar card.....what kinda cpu do you have if you dont have a beefy cpu well your going to bottle neck and 480 or a 5870. If you could post your full pc specs, id be willing to help you out. People that tell you what to get before asking psu amps on the 12v rails and cpu....ect IMO i wouldnt listen to them sry guys.

^^

By that time I'd have a Q9*** processor. Somewhere in that line.

@IllegalPalladin
Yea.. FX4800 is on the ultra high end side of the product. I believe it's around $1.5kish

Right now I'm thinking GTX480 as a viable option.

NVM. Saw the price of 5970. 

a Q9*** is going to bottleneck a 480. You would have to go i7 to get full use of that card. I forgot where i saw the artical but they they did benchmarks to show diff cpus with the 5870 and the 480 and everything but the over clocked i5's and the i7's bottlenecked the cards. If i can find it i will post a link in this thread. Also make sure you have a 40 amp rail for those cards.

What about the six core Thubans? The top model Turbos to 3.6GHz.