@Wolfgang S. To clarify, I am asking specifically about GPUs. Not capture cards.

In Vegas was and is the processor most important, for decoding and editting, how faster the better.
To show effects realtime a good videocard (GPU) is needed and those you need are listed in the program specs.
For rendering that is needed if the processor is used to its max a GPU from specs can help with some codecs to render to.
How faster that one is with enough memory the better, but only for the help to the processor.
How Vegas 17 will handle all this we have to wait, see and try.

@j-v I am very much aware that Vegas benefits most from processor performance. Hence the upgrade to an i9 system. My question is does it make sense to go with a new Nvidia card, or maybe just stick with my old R9. Specifically looking for those with experience with this.

Who do you think have both in one system so they can compare both?

@j-v I am sure there are those who have installed Nvidia cards, and can answer my question. Again, I am just asking if it makes sense to buy a new Nvidia card for this system build. I'm not looking for exact benchmark comparisons.

This image is now updated unfortunately. If I get more Benchmarking results with AMD cards I'll update again.

Look into my signature. I use Nvidia's on desktop and laptop and they are doing good for me in VPro 15 and 16, unless the drivers are the right ones and the system is good build with the right components on the right extensions of the mobo.
Of course I cannot know if they works the same with an i9 processor.

@Former user

Ooo! That benchmark chart is pretty darn handy. Thanks so much!

@j-v Thanks for the info. Neither GPU maker is without its driver issue. Just good to know that folks get good performance and stable results when right. It wasn't so very long ago that only a Radeon card made sense. Now there's just more options on the Nvidia side.

Here's the experience I've had:

Nvidia - Rock solid stability in my GTX 970, however driver updates would frequently break NVENC compatibility in Vegas, or cause bugs/crashes. In exchange for stability, timeline acceleration was nowhere near as good as it is on my current Radeon 7.

AMD - Crappy drivers, my main monitor overscans if I turn it on before windows begins to boot and every time I turn on my LG OLED secondary display, both displays flicker, sometimes the second one comes on, sometimes it just flickers to static and I have to make a settings change to that monitor in windows (like changing resolution or disabling HDR) to send another signal to the TV to get it working, then revert back to previous settings. However, my Radeon 7 screams in Vegas, it's quite nice.... On the flip side, GPU accel in Neat Video no longer works, and there's a couple other apps that GPU acceleration with my card is broken on. The new AMD cards that just dropped might offer similar performance at a better price.

I can say that it just seems to be my TVs the Radeon doesn't like, I was able to run a video projection mapping installation using 3 projectors for 4 days with no problems in the woods of Backwoods Music Festival last month, which is what I consider to be a good GPU stress test for what I do.

@fr0sty

Thanks so much for the info. Timeline performance is key for what I am looking for. Price is defintely a consideration here as you've guessed. I have heard good things about the new Radeon 7. Both companies have some spotty driver history over the years. Back when Radeon cards were produced by ATI, the driver problems were terrible. My old R9 has served well, but the Nvidia bargains are tempting. Thanks.

Worth adding that the neat video folks got back with me and have apparently updated it to work with Radeon 7, in neat bench it clocks in at over 30fps.

This is a Ryzen 7 1800x CPU paired with a Radeon 7 results in Neat Bench.

 

Neat Bench (Neat Image 8.5.0, Neat Video 5.1.0) x64
Copyright (c) 1999-2019 Neat Image team, Neat Video team, ABSoft.
All Rights Reserved.

GPU detection log:

Failed to initialize CUDA driver.
If you use an NVIDIA card, please install the latest video driver with CUDA support.

OpenCL driver version: 2766.5
OpenCL initialized successfully.
Checking OpenCL GPU #1:
GPU device name is: AMD Radeon VII (gfx906)
16192 MB total (16128 MB available during initialization)
Check passed - will attempt to use the device

Neat Video benchmark:

Frame Size:    1920x1080 progressive
Bitdepth:    32 bits per channel
Mix with Original:    Disabled
Temporal Filter:    Enabled
    Quality Mode:    Normal
    Radius:    2 frames
    Dust and Scratches:    Disabled
    Repeat Rate:    0% of repeated frames
    Jitter Filtration:    Normal
Spatial Filter:    Enabled
    Quality Mode:    Normal
    Frequencies:    High, Mid, Low, Very Low
    Artifact Removal:    Enabled
    Edge Smoothing:    Disabled
    Sharpening:    Disabled

Detecting the best combination of performance settings:
running the test data set on up to 16 CPU cores and on up to 1 GPU
AMD Radeon VII: 16192 MB total (16128 MB currently available), using up to 100%

CPU only (1 core): 2.2 frames/sec
CPU only (2 cores): 4.67 frames/sec
CPU only (3 cores): 6.14 frames/sec
CPU only (4 cores): 8.31 frames/sec
CPU only (5 cores): 9.83 frames/sec
CPU only (6 cores): 10.3 frames/sec
CPU only (7 cores): 9.98 frames/sec
CPU only (8 cores): 10.5 frames/sec
CPU only (9 cores): 9.41 frames/sec
CPU only (10 cores): 8.69 frames/sec
CPU only (11 cores): 7.48 frames/sec
CPU only (12 cores): 7.83 frames/sec
CPU only (13 cores): 7.06 frames/sec
CPU only (14 cores): 6.72 frames/sec
CPU only (15 cores): 6.2 frames/sec
CPU only (16 cores): 6.22 frames/sec
GPU only (AMD Radeon VII): 36.7 frames/sec
CPU (2 cores) and GPU (AMD Radeon VII): 13 frames/sec
CPU (3 cores) and GPU (AMD Radeon VII): 16.3 frames/sec
CPU (4 cores) and GPU (AMD Radeon VII): 18.9 frames/sec
CPU (5 cores) and GPU (AMD Radeon VII): 20.9 frames/sec
CPU (6 cores) and GPU (AMD Radeon VII): 21.1 frames/sec
CPU (7 cores) and GPU (AMD Radeon VII): 22.1 frames/sec
CPU (8 cores) and GPU (AMD Radeon VII): 21.8 frames/sec
CPU (9 cores) and GPU (AMD Radeon VII): 19.4 frames/sec
CPU (10 cores) and GPU (AMD Radeon VII): 20.7 frames/sec
CPU (11 cores) and GPU (AMD Radeon VII): 20.2 frames/sec
CPU (12 cores) and GPU (AMD Radeon VII): 19.2 frames/sec
CPU (13 cores) and GPU (AMD Radeon VII): 16.8 frames/sec
CPU (14 cores) and GPU (AMD Radeon VII): 18.2 frames/sec
CPU (15 cores) and GPU (AMD Radeon VII): 17.7 frames/sec
CPU (16 cores) and GPU (AMD Radeon VII): 10.9 frames/sec

Best combination: GPU only (AMD Radeon VII): 36.7 frames/sec
 

In one CPU review I read long time ago: "Different CPUs show different performance in different tasks".

I was laughing first. But... this is true and applied for GPUs as well.

So you cannot really choose the best for your case until you decide what exactly you are optimizing. "Preview performance in Vegas" is not specific enough as we are talking about hundreds of different plugins that might be used during preview in Vegas.

The GTX 1070 should be faster in most cases and it is a bit newer:

https://gpu.userbenchmark.com/Compare/Nvidia-GTX-1070-vs-AMD-R9-380X/3609vs3532

NeatVideo comparison between these GTX 1070 and R9 380 (not X):

http://fifonik.com/nv/?gpu=104%2C106&combine_frequencies=true

Just bought the Radeon VII as an upgrade from that R9 390 we were running. It is much faster at many things, but it is not without major issues. Right now the card is crashing the system whenever it tries to play H265 MOV files from the Fuji XT3. Works fine on the R9 on our other edit suite (and previously on this machine it was fine). So far nothing has resolved it and it's very frustrating. Tried the usual - drivers etc etc. Going to do a major overhaul to the Threadripper 2950X so will see if it's any better after that. If not she's going back to the store.

I haven't had issues with HEVC files rendered by Vegas, FWIW, @mikelinton.

@mikelinton Wow, good to know. This is the sort of thing I was looking for. I would bet it's probably a driver issue, and not the hardware itself. I wouldn't be surprised your issue is later fixed by a driver update. This is all too often the case with newer cards.

@fr0sty yeah still have some playing around to do. I have H265 drone footage I'll try playing with that. The culprit may be QuickTime or something, since the Fuji footage is wrapped in an MOV. It's frustrating. @joeaustin - it's possible drivers may fix it, but it also may never get resolved. Vegas has had some bugs that haven't been squashed in a decade so who knows. Could just be windows, could be Vegas, could be AMD - all the above! 😀 Will see what happens when we overhaul the system next week.

@Wolfgang S. To clarify, I am asking specifically about GPUs. Not capture cards.

Those are not "capture cards" - those are dedicated pro grade Video Cards, and yes, they normally do "capture" as well. I wouldn't say that is their primary function, especially nowadays.

Just bought the Radeon VII as an upgrade from that R9 390 we were running. It is much faster at many things, but it is not without major issues. Right now the card is crashing the system whenever it tries to play H265 MOV files from the Fuji XT3

I would think this is a "Quick Time" issue, not a card issue, per se.

So here's the latest for anyone who cares. :) Swapped the Radeon VII for a 5700 (uses the same driver version) - experiencing similar (albeit very slightly different results). Plays the footage for a few seconds, locks Vegas, screens go black, audio plays for a bit and that's that. On the 5700 I can get back to Windows to force Vegas to close, but on the Radeon VII - the system just crashes. Vegas locks up hard. Ran the AMD utility to clean remove drivers, re-installed - same issue. Tried creating a new project and put int he same footage, same issue. Toggled the legacy GPU option and QSV - same issue. Disable GPU in Vegas, project plays without a hitch. QuickTime is just a wrapper for these, Vegas is doing the heavy lifting on the decode. So it would seem it's an issue with Vegas and this series of AMD drivers and/or GPUs and how it's trying to decode the footage.

@mikelinton Bit of a surprise that there were similar issues with QSV. I would think the Intel GPU would be the most reliable, albeit lower performance. The stability issues might be something to do with Vegas on the newer CPU/Chipsets.

I can say, that on my old rig, i7-4790K/R9 380, Vegas 15 crashes are quite rare. This is with GPU acceleration enabled too. This was not the case early on, and I can't remember if it was a AMD driver, or Vegas update that finally made it stable, but one did.