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"What are the major differences between the consumer-level NVIDIA® GeForce™ family and the workstation-class NVIDIA Quadro® family?"

Many people are still unclear by they should choose a Quadro card when running workstation applications such as, AutoCAD and Autodesk Inventor. In this document we summarise some of the key reasons.
Some of the differences are performance related, and are easy to measure and compare. Others, though, are related to the product's design, development and support structure. These issues become more relevant in the long run, and can make a big difference in long term running costs.
Quadro cards, whilst belonging to the professional range, should not necessarily cost much more than their equivalent consumer card. The flagship models at the top of the range will indeed carry hefty price tags (and also offer top of the range features and performance), but entry level and mid range Quadro cards, designed for general purpose business use and CAD work, are well within the price range of their equivalent Geforce cards.


Performance	Greater performance for workstation applications, maximising the user's productivity. Dedicated drivers for specific applications give faster performance and better compatibility.	It has been noted that key features within workstation software such as "wireframe" to not perform to their full potential. Geforce cards are developed and manufactured to run 3D games at the highest framerate, not to run professional apps.
OpenGL	Standard on all Nvidia cards OpenGL ensures hardware is accelerated.	OpenGL is not hardware accelerated on GeForce Cards.
Specification Requirements	All Quadro boards are built to a standard set and controlled directly by Nvidia to ensure only the highest quality components and specifications are released to market.	Geforce has no standard specification ruling and therefore there are many specifications available, built by varying suppliers.
Support	Quadro has a dedicated support team to ensure technical requests can be dealt with quickly and effectively. There is also a certification program to ensure that all Quadro cards are compatible with leading professional applications.	There is no dedicated team, support requests will be dealt with by the standard technical support team, and be limited to the functionality of the graphics card only.
Life span	Quadro cards have a life span of 24-36 months. This ensures that workstation users get the optimum value for their investment and that productivity is maintained. Avaliability of Quadro cards matched the typical lifespan of a workstation.	GeForce cards have a lifespan of up to 12 months, as these are designed to be used by gamers who regularly update their cards to ensure they can run the latest releases.
Warranty	3 Years Warranty + Exclusive technical support	12 Months Warranty

Quadro Vs Geforce

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