NVIDIA Quadro 5000M vs NVIDIA Quadro M3000M vs NVIDIA Quadro M620

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.

NVIDIA Quadro M3000M

The Nvidia Quadro M3000M is a high-end, DirectX 12 (FL_12_1) and OpenGL 4.5-compatible graphics card for mobile workstations. It is a Maxwell-based GPU built on the GM204 chip with 1024 of the 1536 shader cores activated and is manufactured in 28 nm at TSMC. Therefore, the GPU is similar to the consumer Nvidia GeForce GTX 965M. The Quadro M3000M is built for the Intel Skylake generation and is a successor to the Quadro K3100M (Kepler-based). The M3000M usually comes with 4 GB GDDR5 VRAM clocked at 1250 MHz (5000 MHz effective, 160 GB/s opposed to 102.4 GB/s of the K5100M). 

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 compared to GeForce graphics cards of similar specifications.

Performance

As the exact clock speed of the M3000M is still not known, we can only speculate on the performance of the card. However, it is the mid-range model of the mobile Quadro line in 2015 and based on the same chip as the GeForce GTX 965M. Therefore, it should be clearly faster than the old Quadro K3100M.

Using CUDA (Compute Capability 5.2) or OpenCL 1.2, the cores of the Quadro M3000M can be used for general calculations.

Power Consumption

The power consumption of the Quadro M3000M is rated at the same TGP of 75 Watt as the K3100M (including the board and memory components). Therefore, the card is suited for large notebooks with 17-inch displays or greater and 25 Watt less than the M4000M and M5000M.

NVIDIA Quadro M620

The 28nm NVIDIA Quadro M620 is a mid-range DirectX 12 (FL 11_0) and OpenGL 4.5-compatible graphics card for mobile workstations. It is a 1st generation Maxwell-based GPU built on the GM107 architecture with 512 of the 640 shader cores activated. Therefore, the GPU is not similar to any current consumer card. The Geforce GTX 950M, for example, uses the full 640 shader cores. The older Quadro M1000M offers very similar specs (same amount of shader cores and also based on the same chip but more graphics memory), but was intended for the Skylake generation. The M620 is intended for the Kaby Lake generation.

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 compared to GeForce graphics cards of similar specifications.

Performance

Due to the smaller amount of memory, the Quadro M620 should be slightly slower than the older Quadro M1000M. However, the exact clock speeds are not known up to now. In early benchmarks we have, the M1000M is about 9 % faster than the M620 in SPECviewperf 12.

Using CUDA (Compute Capability 5.0) or OpenCL 1.2, the cores of the Quadro M620 can be used for general calculations.

Power Consumption

The power consumption of the Quadro M620 is rated for a 30 Watt TGP including the board and memory components (21.2 Watt TDP), which is 10 Watt lower than the M1000M (which offers more memory). Therefore, the card is suited for 15-inch notebooks and greater.