CPU/GPU What's Considered a "really high end" Video Card?

[rschildt]

In the "What's New" for 7.0.3.0 it states:

* New: Added our own CUDA H.264 encoder. Note: If the video card is really high end, we recommend to enable both CUDA decoder and encoder for max speed. If the video card is not, we suggest to use CUDA encoder for BD25 output, and use CUDA decoder for BD5 and BD9 output.

So what's considered "really high end"? I have the nVidia GeForce GT 240, which is in the new lineup of cards. It's supposedly similar to the older 9XXX models, but on a new platform. More GPU cores than the 9600 GT, but less than the 9800 GT. Not nearly as good as the higher models in th 2XX & 3XX lines, but still listed as 11x the graphics power of the 8400GS.

What about DXVA? I believe the defaults when I started the V7 Beta had DXVA for decoding and CUDA for encoding. I'll try CUDA for both on the next backup, and then try experimenting with other settings. Just wondered what others are using as setting and the performance with those.

I've attached a graphic from the nVidia web site that shows what they consider to be the relative performance of their line.

[W&B]

GT cards are low end, GTS cards are in the middle and high end cards is the GTX models. (of course there are different variables of each that are better than others).

I had a GT 9500 and just got a GTS 250. I noticed a small gain in performance.

[rschildt]

That's a pretty good and simple explanation. Thanks!