The chameleon's changing skin illustrates just a few of the many stunning effects possible with GeForce3's nfiniteFX engine. Courtesy of and © nVidia.

Installation
I installed the Quadro DCC into a 1.7Ghz Pentium 4 workstation with 768MB of RAM running Windows 2000. It fits in the AGP slot of the motherboard and then connects to a CRT (standard VGA D-shell 15 pin) or digital flat panel monitor (DVI-I), as well as a TV through the S-Video port. Next comes the drivers dance as Windows 2000 and the Quadro DCC try to decide on which driver to install. After a few different tries, I found one that worked. The nVidia Website now has the latest ones available for download.

Also provided with the Quadro DCC is an application-specific driver for 3ds max called MAXtreme. This driver is fully optimized for 3ds max and allows it to do things that are otherwise impossible, such as real-time fog and realistic transparency. If you are running an application in OpenGL, such as Maya, Softimage or Lightwave, the Windows Display Properties nVidia panel has specific presets to enhance performance in those applications.

Performance
I ran some standard benchmarking tests that indicate viewport framerate under a variety of simulated working conditions (i.e., wireframe, shaded, textured and lit models and animations). The results were in keeping with the published stats for the card — which is to say, very good numbers. But the real proof is in actually creating models and animations and seeing how things run. I used 3ds max 4.2 and Maya 4 to build and animate complex polygonal, NURBS and subdivision surface models, add textures and lights, navigate around scenes and place cameras. In this typical workflow the Quadro DCC felt very agile.

Maya's interactive paint and sculpture tools were responsive and fun to use, thanks to the Quadro DCC's fast redraw speeds. Dense polygon meshes with over 20,000 faces were quick to update, and only a tessellation to 50,000 polygons stressed the card and caused stuttering framerates.

The performance in 3ds max was also excellent across the board — it's no wonder that the Elsa branded version of this card will be offered directly from discreet resellers. Normal modeling operations and viewport navigation ran very smoothly, and the ability to anti-alias wireframes through the MAXtreme control panel provides some relief from eyestrain. Scenes can combine RGB Multiply materials, transparency, colored lighting, specular maps, fog and particles -- making 3ds max look more like a next-generation game than a 3D program.