Although 3D speed is not a factor with Vegas, if you want to plan for the future, get a video card that supports WUXGA resolution (1920x1200).

The future of LCD displays is larger screens and a16X9 ratio. I just purchased a 24" Dell widescreen LCD and its default resolution is 1920X1200. On their sale page, Dell has a list of video cards that support this monitor, and when my Matrox P650 wasn't in the list, I was concerned. However, after a little research, I found that Matrox has a software utility that allows you to enter your own resolution numbers. Fortunately I was able to manually enter 1920X1200.

Having dual DVI output is also better than one DVI and one analog.

I found the P650 refurbished for $90 which is about the best price your gonna find for dual DVI output.

Also get a card that is DX 9 compatible. Future versions of windows (ie longhorn) appear to use 3d acceleration & need a DX 9 or better card.

It appears that none of the matrox cards are DX-9 compatible.

http://www.matrox.com/mga/products/comp_chart/gseries_pseries_parhelia.cfm

edit:

So what would be a good low cost, used primarily for Vegas, dual DVI, DX9 compatible, WUXGA resolution (1920x1200) card?

Jeff

If you ever plan on using something like Boris Red that uses graphics card accelleration, you'll want to consider something with some power. My matrox g550 is not cutting it for use with Boris Red, Combustion, etc. I find most editors eventually want to have this kind of option, but maybe for the time being you could get by with a cheaper card just for Vegas. Just thought I'd mention that in case you had plans to experiement with compositing outside Vegas.

I've got the NVidia Quadra FX 1300 in one of my machines and for serious work outside of Vegas that's perhaps the minimum I'd recommend. Bear in mind that there is some difference in the quality of DVI outputs as you start to push the envelope.
Bob.

Also, if you plan to use Ultra 2, check out their list of supported cards. I have a Matrox G450DH and it, apparently, is not supported. A factoid I found out after I had paid for the upgrade.

Tom

I recently got a Sapphire Radeon 9800 Pro 256 mb. It is the new lower end for some of the new games out there but also is better for After Effects (3d opengl) and works well with Ultra 2 (just got it yesterday). The price is now within my threshold of pain so I went ahead and upgraded from a 8500. Not a huge jump but I can stay with this for awhile. Newegg has them (I have never had a bad experience with them -- once returned a Nvidia based graphics card and they refunded me without hassle)

-TomE

Tom,

From the brochure it seemed like it has one DVI-I (with VGA dongle), one VGA and one Svideo. Will it support 2 DVI monitors?

thanks,

Jeff

Jeff,

Matrox do have beta dx9 drivers for some of their cards:

http://www.matrox.com/mga/support/drivers/files/2kxp_106_beta_dx9.cfm

Richard.

Just to put the Ultra 2 problem in perspective, it's not DX9 support, but (the response from SeriousMagic support): "The G450 video card from Matrox is not supported in ULTRA 2. Since ULTRA 2 relies on GPU features in modern video cards, it needs certain hardware functionality to run. The G450 was originally engineered in 1998, and the chips on the card just don’t support Direct3D functions like competing cards."

Tom

"From the brochure it seemed like it has one DVI-I (with VGA dongle), one VGA and one Svideo. Will it support 2 DVI monitors?"

Jeff,

They have variations that do support two DVI.(You will need to read the specs to make sure they have all the other features you are looking for.) I still use CRTs. I occasionally use the s-video out also and it works great.

TomE

"Bear in mind that there is some difference in the quality of DVI outputs as you start to push the envelope."

I had not heard that previously. Seems to me this is pretty important for people who want to use the DVI video output for monitoring. I understand that FCP has this same kind of feature, but it's useless for any kind of color critical work as the Mac plays around with the signal of things that go through DVI.
So, can we trust DVI for color correction? Are there video cards to avoid, ones that we can trust?

OK:- I just decided to get either the SONY SDM-P234/B (Spot likes it) or the Dell 2405FPW (Liam likes it) both of which are 1920x1200 and need WUXGA 1920 and DX9. My nVidia PCX5300 will not cut it so what's an economy card that will do a good job for watching/editing HDV at full resolution with these monitors?

Cheers,

Mike Stevens

As no one replied to this thread after my last post I'm going to tell you what I'm planning on ordering in the AM for moniotring my Vegas6 HD editing. If you think I'm making a mistake then tell me now or for ever hold your piece - or do I mean peace?

Dell UltraSharp 2405FPW 24" Widescreen 1920x1200 WUXGA monitor
ATI Raedeon X850XT Platunum Edition 256MB PCI-Express graphics card

I've got the NVIDIA Quadra FX 1300 in my big beast. This is not a consummer card so they're harder to buy, dual DVI outputs though and yes PCI-E with 128MB. I probably should have gone for 256 MB but the thing was expensive enough as it was.
Bob.

The bleeding edge for computer hardware is always overpriced, so I'd avoid it unless your productivity depends on it.

MH_Stevens: In your case, I'd probably get a ~$60-90 video card right now (look for DVI+VGA output). If and when you need a better video card, buy a new video card then. In the future, video cards will get a lot faster + cheaper. A $900 video card now might cost $300 2 years from now.

Good rules of thumb:
Video cards double in speed every 1.5-2 years.
At the high end, you pay exponentially more for increased performance.

Glen: Computer things ALWAYS get faster and cheaper. If you kep waiting you never have it. Do you really know a $90 video card that can play 1920x1080 full res HDV at 30fps? I don't think so. I need a graphics card that will drive a full res 1920x1080 monitor at FULL frame rate when previewing Vegas edits, rendered of from the timeline, and play a WMV9 file at full res and full frame rate AND it needs COMPONENT in to handle the Sony HDV cameras.

I'm right there with you on the 24" dell. You kind of lost me when you said:

"I need a graphics card that will drive a full res 1920x1080 monitor at FULL frame rate when previewing Vegas edits, rendered of from the timeline, and play a WMV9 file at full res and full frame rate AND it needs COMPONENT in to handle the Sony HDV cameras."

Unless I'm wrong Vegas can't use the extra power of such a card and the extra memory etc isn't needed for HD previewing. Now that power would come in handy for compositing tools like Boris and After Effects. I'm looking to upgrade myself to play with these cool tools.
Also don't understand the component in and HDV thing. HDV should be entered into the computer via firewire I believe. Are you talking about component in for the monitor? Now that is a nice feature I believe. You're not looking to try to capture uncompressed out of the HDV cam, are you?
Maybe this is the migraine talking, but I think you may be expecting the graphics card to do the job of a decklink type card. Again, unless I'm wrong, any graphics card with DVI and the proper resolution capabilities (1920x1200) should do the job.

This is correct, you will not get a video card that O know of with somponent inputs and certainly not one that'll handle HD.
For that you will need a Declink card AND an extremely fast computer with SCSI RAID and that'll really burn the wallet.
Go have a look on the BMD site for specs on a disk array that'll handle 4.4.4 10 bit video.
The ONLY time you'd need this is if you are trying to capture directly from the camera rather than from the HDV tape.
Bob.

Sorry for any confusion - I was trying to cover too much ground in one sentance. My need is to drive the Dell, as a second monitoing only monitor, for editing previewing/color correction. Wanted full screen full 1920x1080 res and full frame rate while previewing. Is this obtainable?

Yes it is and the Dell should be a good choice. Bought one myself. Like I said, you need to run a dvi out from your graphics card and make sure it handles 1920x1200 w/o any compromises. This may be what they call its 'native' resolution. Not sure. Anyway, for this you would probably want a dual DVI card.
Now farss made an interesting statement a little while ago about not all graphics cards being equal with respect to their DVI and some could be counted on for accurate color and some couldn't. Maybe if you ask him very nicely he'll expand on that.
Anyway, using your 2nd DVI on your graphics card would be the cheapest way to go. The decklink options are obviously an added expense and may or may not offer you much if you don't plan on connecting to various professional decks (like digibeta or dvc pro hd decks). If these things are not in your plan, like if you're going to be using HDV, then I would think the primary reason to buy a decklink card would be to still have the ability to run 2 monitors with vegas and have a 3rd monitor (in your case the 24" dell) available for HD monitoring. Trying not to complecate things too much, but there may be a possibility of running 2 graphics cards and acheiving this same end with DVI. I don't know if this is possible, but is definitely something to look into.
The component inputs of your dell may come in handy for field monitoring of HD material. I'm planning on doing this myself and I trying to figure out the best way to have portable power to run the monitor.
Finally, if you are at all interested in decklink stuff, some can downconvert HD material to SD so you can use your SD monitor for previewing HD material. Also, some decklink cards might allow for external previewing of After Effects and/or Photoshop. These are certainly handy tool and this option may or may not be useful to you.
Hope this helps!

I can help with the field power. Cosco has some cheap inverters that will power your monitor from a 12v car battery. With regard to my graphics card choice - don't I need a card with the processing and memory to run the HDV smothly at full resolution or is this a CPU issue? Let me put it this way. My current card's an nVidia FX5300 PCIe and costs only about $150. A Quadro 1400 or a Matrox X100 costs nearer $2000! What would I be getting extra for this huge jump with regard to full screen monitoring of my Vegas HDV?