NVIDIA Quadro K500M vs NVIDIA Quadro 5000M

NVIDIA Quadro K500M

The NVIDIA Quadro K500M is an entry-level, DirectX 11.1-compatible graphics card for mobile workstations. It is a Kepler-based GPU built on the GK107 architecture and is manufactured in 28nm at TSMC. Compared to the K2000M, the K500M only features a 64-Bit memory bus and 192 shader cores instead of 384. The Quadro K500M is built for the Intel Chief River generation (Ivy Bridge) and is the successor to the Fermi-based Quadro 1000M (Huron River platform).

The Quadro series offers certified drivers that are optimized for stability and performance in professional applications like CAD or DCC. OpenGL performance, for example, should be significantly better than GeForce graphics cards of similar specifications.

Architecture

The Kepler architecture is the successor to the Fermi architecture that first appeared in laptops with the GeForce 400M series. The GK107 Kepler core offers two shader blocks, called SMX, each with 192 shaders for a total of 384 shader cores that are clocked at the same speed as the central core. The K500M, however, offers only one SMX with 192 shaders. Although more shader cores are available in the Kepler architecture as compared to the Fermi design, the Kepler shaders are still expected to be up to twice as power efficient. However, due to the missing hot clock of the shader domain, two shaders of a Kepler chip are about as fast as one shader of a Fermi chip (as the latter is clocked twice as fast).

PCIe 3.0 is now supported by the mobile Kepler series and an optional Turbo mode can automatically overclock the Nvidia card by a theoretical 15 percent if the laptop cooling system allows it. The implementation of this boost mode is done in the BIOS, but it is ultimately dependent upon the manufacturer of the laptop.

Performance

The gaming performance should be similar to the consumer GeForce GT 620M.

Features

The improved feature set now includes support for up to 4 active displays. Furthermore, high resolution monitors of up to 3840x2160 pixels can now be connected using DisplayPort 1.2 or HDMI 1.4a if available. HD-Audio codecs, such as Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD, can be transmitted via bitstream mode through the HDMI port. However, as most laptops will feature Optimus, the integrated GPU will likely have direct control over the display ports and may limit the feature set available by the Nvidia Kepler cards.

The 5th generation PureVideo HD video processor (VP5) is also integrated in the GK107 core and offers hardware decoding of HD videos. Common codecs such as MPEG-1/2, MPEG-4 ASP, H.264 and VC1/WMV9 are fully supported up to 4K resolutions while VC1 and MPEG-4 are supported up to 1080p. Two streams can be decoded in parallel for features such as Picture-in-Picture. Another novelty is the inclusion of a dedicated video encoding engine similar to Intel QuickSync that can be accessed by the NVENC API.

The power consumption of the K500M is rated at 35 Watt (TGP according to Nvidia) and therefore suited for medium-sized notebooks of 15-inches or greater.

NVIDIA Quadro 5000M

The NVIDIA Quadro 5000M is a professional workstation graphics card based on the Fermi architecture. Therefore, the 5000M likely shares many similarities  to the GeForce GTX 480M which offers more CUDA cores. The Quadro is the first mobile GPU that offers ECC RAM and double-precision floating point cores.

The Quadro series also offers certified drivers that are optimized for stability and performance in professional applications like CAD or DCC. OpenGL performance, for example, should be significantly better than GeForce graphics cards of similar specifications. 

The shader/CUDA cores can be accessed using DirectX 11 or OpenGL 4.1 for graphics rendering and DirectCompute, OpenCL, AXE and CUDA for general purpose calculations. Due to the new Fermi core, the 5000M should offer higher performance in general purpose calculations compared to its predecessors.

Furthermore, the Quadro 5000M is compatible with Nvidia 3D Vision Pro for stereoscopic viewing.

Similar to the GeForce GTX 480M, the Quadro 5000M is specified at 100 Watt TDP and is therefore usually reserved for large laptops with ample cooling, such as the Clevo D901F.

At the time of arrival (mid 2010), the Quadro 5000M was the fastest professional workstation graphics card for laptops and is the successor to the old G92b-based GeForce FX 3800M. Compared to desktop Quadro cards, the mobile Quadro 5000M offers less shader cores and likely a lower core clock rate as well.