NVIDIA CMP 70HX vs NVIDIA GRID M60-1Q Comparison

The NVIDIA GRID M60-1Q and NVIDIA CMP 70HX are two end-of-life graphics cards from NVIDIA that serve completely different purposes but end up in similar performance brackets in modern benchmark suites. The GRID M60-1Q is a Maxwell-era virtualization card designed for datacenter workloads, while the CMP 70HX is an Ampere-based mining card stripped of display outputs. Despite their different origins, both land within a few percent of each other in aggregate benchmark scores, though their architectural approaches and feature sets diverge sharply.

Where Each One Wins

The benchmark data shows a clear split between the two cards. The CMP 70HX wins the only head-to-head benchmark available, the Geekbench Vulkan test, with a score of 35817 against the GRID M60-1Q's 31220. That is a 12.8% delta in favor of the CMP 70HX, which is a substantial margin in GPU terms. The CMP 70HX also has a secondary OpenCL score of 25135, though no comparable OpenCL result exists for the GRID M60-1Q in the data.

However, the GRID M60-1Q is not without its strengths. In the Vulkan benchmark, the GRID M60-1Q's score of 31220 places it at the 76th percentile of all GPUs, while the CMP 70HX sits at the 75th percentile. The GRID M60-1Q's nearest rival is the NVIDIA Quadro M5000 with an average score of 31206, showing a 0% delta — essentially a tie. The CMP 70HX's nearest rival is the NVIDIA Tesla M60 at 30490, also a 0% delta. What this means practically is that the GRID M60-1Q is slightly better positioned relative to its peers in Vulkan compute, even though the CMP 70HX posts a higher raw number. The CMP 70HX pulls ahead in raw throughput, but the GRID M60-1Q holds its own in percentile ranking, making it the more efficient choice if you are comparing against the broader GPU landscape.

Architecture Differences

The architectural gap between these two cards is enormous, reflecting a generational leap of several years. The GRID M60-1Q is built on the GM204 chip using Maxwell 2.0 architecture, fabricated on a 28 nm process at TSMC. It packs 5,200 million transistors into a 398 mm² die, which translates to a transistor density of 13.1 million per square millimeter. The CMP 70HX, by contrast, uses the GA104 chip with Ampere architecture, manufactured on Samsung's 8 nm process. It contains 17,400 million transistors on a 392 mm² die, achieving a much higher density of 44.4 million per square millimeter. The CMP 70HX is essentially cramming more than three times the transistor density into a similar physical footprint.

Memory configurations differ as well. The GRID M60-1Q ships with only 1024 MB of GDDR5 memory on a 256-bit bus, yielding 160.4 GB/s of bandwidth. The CMP 70HX offers 8 GB of GDDR6X memory, also on a 256-bit bus, but with 608.3 GB/s of bandwidth — nearly four times the memory bandwidth. The CMP 70HX also has far more compute resources: 3840 shading units, 120 TMUs, and 64 ROPs, compared to the GRID M60-1Q's 2048 shading units, 128 TMUs, and 64 ROPs. Crucially, the CMP 70HX includes 30 RT cores and 120 tensor cores, which the GRID M60-1Q lacks entirely. The CMP 70HX supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2), while the GRID M60-1Q is limited to DirectX 12 (12_1). Both cards have no display outputs, which makes sense given their respective datacenter and mining origins.

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The only direct benchmark comparison in the data is the Geekbench Vulkan test, and it tells a straightforward story. The CMP 70HX scores 35817, while the GRID M60-1Q scores 31220. The CMP 70HX wins by 12.8%, which is a decisive margin. To put that in context, the GRID M60-1Q's nearest rival is the RTX 4070 Ti SUPER at 31087, just 0.4% behind — so the GRID M60-1Q is essentially matching a modern high-end consumer card in Vulkan compute. The CMP 70HX, meanwhile, sits 1.8% ahead of the RTX 3070 Ti at 29945, showing it punches above its mining-focused design.

The CMP 70HX's OpenCL score of 25135 is worth noting, though without a corresponding GRID M60-1Q score, it is difficult to make a direct comparison. However, the fact that the CMP 70HX's Vulkan score is significantly higher than its OpenCL score suggests the card is optimized for the Vulkan API, which aligns with its compute-heavy design. The GRID M60-1Q's lone Vulkan score of 31220 is respectable but trails the CMP 70HX by a clear margin. If you are running Vulkan workloads, the CMP 70HX is the faster card, period. The GRID M60-1Q does not offer any benchmark where it comes out ahead in the head-to-head data.

FAQ

Q: Which card has higher raw performance in the benchmark data?

A: The CMP 70HX wins the only shared benchmark, Geekbench Vulkan, with a score of 35817 versus the GRID M60-1Q's 31220, a 12.8% advantage.

Q: How do the two cards compare in terms of memory bandwidth?

A: The CMP 70HX has 608.3 GB/s of bandwidth with 8 GB of GDDR6X memory, while the GRID M60-1Q has 160.4 GB/s with 1024 MB of GDDR5. The CMP 70HX offers nearly four times the bandwidth.

Q: Are both cards suitable for gaming?

A: Neither card has display outputs, so neither can be connected directly to a monitor. The GRID M60-1Q is a virtualization card, and the CMP 70HX is a mining card, both designed for non-gaming workloads.

Q: What is the architectural generation difference?

A: The GRID M60-1Q uses Maxwell 2.0 on a 28 nm process, while the CMP 70HX uses Ampere on an 8 nm process. The CMP 70HX also adds RT cores and tensor cores that the GRID M60-1Q lacks.

Q: Does the GRID M60-1Q have any advantages in the data?

A: The GRID M60-1Q has a higher percentile ranking at 76% versus the CMP 70HX's 75%, and it matches the Quadro M5000 exactly at 31206. It also has a higher texture rate relative to its shading units, though the CMP 70HX still wins on raw texture rate at 167.4 GTexel/s versus 150.8 GTexel/s.

Q: What is the power supply requirement difference?

A: The GRID M60-1Q has a suggested PSU of 550 W with a 225 W TDP, while the CMP 70HX has a suggested PSU of 200 W and no listed TDP. The GRID M60-1Q requires a single 8-pin connector, and the CMP 70HX uses a single 12-pin connector.

The Verdict

The data points to the CMP 70HX as the stronger performer in raw compute. It wins the Vulkan benchmark by 12.8%, offers substantially more memory and bandwidth, and has a more modern architecture with support for DirectX 12 Ultimate and hardware ray tracing capabilities via its RT cores. If your workload is Vulkan-based or heavily memory-bound, the CMP 70HX is the clear choice from the benchmark evidence.

The GRID M60-1Q, however, should not be dismissed. Its percentile ranking of 76th is actually higher than the CMP 70HX's 75th, and it ties the Quadro M5000 with a 0% delta, showing it holds its own against professional-grade cards. Its lower power draw, with a 225 W TDP versus the CMP 70HX's unspecified TDP but lower suggested PSU of 200 W, makes it a more predictable power consumer. The GRID M60-1Q also has a higher texture rate relative to its shading unit count, suggesting it may have efficiency advantages in certain texture-heavy workloads.

For most compute tasks, the CMP 70HX is the better buy based on the numbers. It delivers 10.71 TFLOPS of FP32 performance versus the GRID M60-1Q's 4.825 TFLOPS, and its memory bandwidth advantage is overwhelming. The GRID M60-1Q makes sense only if you specifically need Maxwell-era virtualization compatibility or if your software stack is optimized for that architecture. Otherwise, the CMP 70HX's modern Ampere design, with its tensor and RT cores, gives it a future-proofing edge that the GRID M60-1Q simply cannot match.

Specification Differences

| Specification | NVIDIA GRID M60-1Q | NVIDIA CMP 70HX |

|---------------|-------------------|-----------------|

| Architecture | Maxwell 2.0 | Ampere |

| Process Node | 28 nm | 8 nm |

| Foundry | TSMC | Samsung |

| Transistors | 5,200 million | 17,400 million |

| Die Size | 398 mm² | 392 mm² |

| Transistor Density | 13.1M / mm² | 44.4M / mm² |

| Base Clock | 557 MHz | 1365 MHz |

| Boost Clock | 1178 MHz | 1395 MHz |

| Memory Size | 1024 MB | 8 GB |

| Memory Type | GDDR5 | GDDR6X |

| Memory Bus | 256 bit | 256 bit |

| Memory Bandwidth | 160.4 GB/s | 608.3 GB/s |

| Shading Units | 2048 | 3840 |

| TMUs | 128 | 120 |

| ROPs | 64 | 64 |

| RT Cores | None | 30 |

| Tensor Cores | None | 120 |

| Pixel Rate | 75.39 GPixel/s | 89.28 GPixel/s |

| Texture Rate | 150.8 GTexel/s | 167.4 GTexel/s |

| FP32 Performance | 4.825 TFLOPS | 10.71 TFLOPS |

| FP16 Performance | None listed | 10.71 TFLOPS (1:1) |

| TDP | 225 W | Not listed |

| Power Connectors | 1x 8-pin | 1x 12-pin |

| Suggested PSU | 550 W | 200 W |

| Bus Interface | PCIe 3.0 x16 | PCIe 1.0 x4 |

| DirectX Support | 12 (12_1) | 12 Ultimate (12_2) |

| Height | Not listed | 112 mm (4.4 inches) |

| Memory Clock | 1253 MHz (5 Gbps effective) | 1188 MHz (19 Gbps effective) |