NVIDIA Rounds Out Its Maxwell-based Quadro Lineup With The M2000

NVIDIA’s Quadro team has sure been on a release rampage this past month. First came along the second-generation top-end M6000, which now sports 24GB of GDDR5, and soon after, we were hit with the M5500, a desktop-class card designed for notebooks.

On the table now is a bit of a special release, the Quadro M2000. What makes it special is the fact that this is the final Maxwell-based Quadro that’s going to be released. That might sound a bit sad given that there are some Kepler-based cards that haven’t yet been updated (only at the low-end), but the best way to look at this is: Pascal is next. I am excited at the thought of what Pascal-based Quadros will do, as the Tesla P100 NVIDIA announced at its GPU Technology Conference a couple of weeks ago is nothing short of incredible.

With the M2000 being the final Maxwell-based Quadro, it means that NVIDIA only has 4 such models available, which in addition to the M6000 24GB includes the M5000 and M4000. NVIDIA considers the Kepler-based K1200, K620, and K420 to be part of its current line-up.

When I was briefed on the M2000, I was told that it wouldn’t immediately replace the K2200, but the Quadro product page claims otherwise. Versus the K2200 (which can be seen in the table above), the M2000 has more cores and more memory bandwidth, but the advantages go beyond that. With Maxwell, power efficiency was much-improved over Kepler, and not to mention overall performance (even outside of a core count bump).

With its $500 price-point, the Quadro M2000 is catering to those who deal with “medium” CAD projects or have lighter 3D design needs (eg: designing and rendering a smartphone case). Despite its modest aesthetic, the M2000 packs a lot of power under its hood. The card is comparable to the GeForce GTX 950 from NVIDIA’s gaming lineup, which is able to handle modern games at 1080p with midrange detail levels.

The M2000 brings some bonus tricks with it, as well. Compared to the K2200, the M2000 has much-improved geometry performance, which could make manipulating 3D models a night-and-day difference between the new and old Quadro. It also has dedicated H.264 and HEVC encode engines, and naturally, also adds PCIe 3.0 support. It’s also worth nothing that NVIDIA decided against including a DVI port on this card, instead opting for 4x DisplayPort. That’s a good move as far as we’re concerned, as DVI ports take up too much space. Retail cards are sure to include options for DP-to-DVI adapters to solve the problem for those without DisplayPort monitors. For those with high-resolution displays, the M2000 supports 4x 4K (60Hz), 2x 5K (60Hz), or 1x 8K.

The Quadro M2000 is expected to hit etail at any moment, with NVIDIA guesstimating that the street price will be close to $450. We’ll be taking a look at this card in the very near-future, so stay tuned.