Consumer graphics cards have reached astonishing levels of performance, but the professional segment follows different parameters, focusing on optimizations that are far more useful when developing content. In March of last year, Nvidia introduced its Quadro M6000 with 12 GB of RAM, but today the company is re-launching the exact same hardware at the same price, with double the memory.
For years, we've asked ourselves why a computer or a particular piece of hardware needs to improve its specifications. What reason was there to go beyond 640 kilobytes? How would we ever fill a one-gigabyte hard drive? Fortunately, both hardware and software have answered these and similar questions. Today we enjoy things like multiple cores, 4K resolution, virtual reality, and of course, games that push graphics quality further with each generation. Add to that the extraordinary progress of animated films and the fabulous tools at their disposal. A great example is the Quadro series of professional cards sold by Nvidia. Its latest update was the Quadro M6000, based on the Maxwell 2 architecture. Even though it's been on the market for a year, its resources remain formidable, so Nvidia's news is that the Quadro M6000 is being re-released with double the memory.
The specifications of the new Quadro M6000
That's right: this new version brings the total available RAM in GDDR5 to no less than 24 gigabytes, comfortably surpassing the AMD FirePro W9100 with 16 GB. If we look at the rest of the specifications, we won't find any difference: 8 billion transistors, a 384-bit bus, 3,072 CUDA cores, 192 texture units, a Boost frequency of 1,140 MHz, and an average TDP of 250 watts. According to the official presentation, the most important differences between the two editions of the Quadro M6000 (aside from the amount of RAM) are a much more precise control of frequency and temperature, letting users establish different relationships between the two depending on the situation.
Price and availability
Without a doubt, Nvidia knows exactly who should be offered these cards, but everyone interested needs to know that the new 24 GB Quadro M6000 keeps the same price as the previous version: $5,000. The hardware's formal debut will take place at some point during the rest of the week.
