NVIDIA Quadro K5200 vs NVIDIA Quadro RTX 5000 Comparison

The NVIDIA Quadro RTX 5000 and the NVIDIA Quadro K5200 are both end-of-life workstation cards from NVIDIA, separated by roughly four years of engineering. The RTX 5000 arrived in August of 2018 as part of the Quadro Turing generation, while the K5200 shipped in July of 2014 under the Quadro Kepler line. The database contains direct head-to-head benchmark results for both cards, and the recorded data shows a decisive gap in favor of the newer card, though the two occupy surprisingly similar percentile positions against the full GPU population. What follows is a step-by-step walkthrough of where each card stands.

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

Only two tests appear in the head-to-head set for this pairing, but both are unambiguous. In the Geekbench OpenCL test, the Quadro RTX 5000 scored 78,999 against the K5200's 19,024, a lead of 315.3 percent. The Vulkan test is even more lopsided: 92,309 versus 20,180, which works out to a 357.4 percent advantage for the RTX 5000. That means the RTX 5000 delivers more than four times the compute throughput of the K5200 in these workloads, and closer to five times in the Vulkan run.

Those gains line up with the raw silicon. The RTX 5000 posts 11.15 TFLOPS of FP32 compute against 3.553 TFLOPS for the K5200, roughly a threefold raw shading advantage, and the benchmark scores exceed that ratio, suggesting the newer architecture extracts disproportionately more performance per FLOP in real compute APIs. The memory subsystem tells a similar story: 448.0 GB/s of bandwidth on GDDR6 versus 192.3 GB/s on GDDR5, more than a doubling in available data throughput.

The K5200 wins nothing in the recorded head-to-head set. Its sole competitive claim is contextual: with an average benchmark score of 19,602 it sits at the 64th percentile against all GPUs in the database, only three points below the RTX 5000's 67th percentile. That closeness reflects how the percentile field is computed across the mixed database population rather than any direct parity, and readers should weigh the head-to-head numbers far more heavily than the percentile spread.

Against their respective nearest rivals, the picture is consistent with the head-to-head. The RTX 5000's average score of 21,629 places it within about one percent of the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 6 GB, slightly ahead of the NVIDIA RTX A4000 Mobile by 1.2 percent, and ahead of the AMD Radeon HD 8970M and AMD Radeon RX Vega M GL by 1.8 and 2.3 percent respectively. The K5200's average of 19,602 trails the AMD FirePro D300 by 0.2 percent and the AMD Radeon RX 6650 XT by 0.8 percent, while sitting ahead of the AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX by 1 percent and the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 3 GB by 1.4 percent. Both cards cluster in the same mid-tier neighborhood of the database's average-score rankings, but in direct measurement the RTX 5000 is in a different class.

The Verdict

The data leaves no room for interpretation on performance. Anyone choosing between these two cards for GPU compute, OpenCL workloads, or Vulkan-driven applications should pick the Quadro RTX 5000: the recorded wins are 2-0, and both margins exceed 315 percent. The RTX 5000 also offers 16 GB of GDDR6 against 8 GB of GDDR5, double the memory capacity with more than double the bandwidth, which matters for large datasets and professional scene complexity.

The case for the K5200 rests entirely on operating constraints rather than speed. Its TDP is 150 W against 230 W for the RTX 5000, it draws power through a single 6-pin connector rather than a 6-pin plus 8-pin combination, and its suggested PSU is 450 W rather than 550 W. In a chassis or power envelope that cannot accommodate the newer card's demands, the K5200 is the only one of the two that fits. Both cards are dual-slot and share identical physical dimensions, 267 mm long and 111 mm tall, so spatial fit is not a differentiator.

Both cards are end-of-life, so availability rather than positioning will drive most real-world decisions between them.

Architecture Differences

The generational divide here is substantial. The RTX 5000 is built on the TU104 chip using NVIDIA's Turing architecture on a 12 nm TSMC process, packing 13,600 million transistors into a 545 mm² die for a density of 25.0 million transistors per square millimeter. The K5200 uses the GK110B chip, Kepler architecture, and a 28 nm TSMC process, with 7,080 million transistors across a slightly larger 561 mm² die and a density of 12.6 million per square millimeter. The RTX 5000 achieves roughly double the transistor density on a slightly smaller die.

Core counts also diverge. The RTX 5000 carries 3,072 shading units, 192 TMUs, 64 ROPs, and critically 48 RT cores plus 384 tensor cores, hardware that simply does not exist on the K5200. The K5200 has 2,304 shading units, the same 192 TMUs, and only 48 ROPs. Clocks scale accordingly: the RTX 5000 runs a 1620 MHz base and 1815 MHz boost clock with memory at 14 Gbps effective, while the K5200 runs 667 MHz base, 771 MHz boost, and 6 Gbps effective memory.

Feature support follows the same pattern. The RTX 5000 reports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2) and Vulkan 1.4, while the K5200 reports DirectX 12 (11_1) and Vulkan 1.2.175; both list OpenGL 4.6. The output stacks differ too: the RTX 5000 provides four DisplayPort 1.4a outputs plus one USB Type-C, whereas the K5200 offers two DVI and two DisplayPort 1.2 connectors. Both use PCIe 3.0 x16. Lineage-wise, the RTX 5000 succeeded Quadro Volta and was itself succeeded by the workstation Ampere line, while the K5200 followed Quadro Fermi and gave way to Quadro Maxwell.

FAQ

Q: How much faster is the Quadro RTX 5000 than the K5200 in compute benchmarks?

A: It scored 315.3 percent higher in Geekbench OpenCL (78,999 versus 19,024) and 357.4 percent higher in Geekbench Vulkan (92,309 versus 20,180).

Q: Do both cards support ray tracing hardware?

A: No. The RTX 5000 includes 48 RT cores and 384 tensor cores as part of its Turing design. The K5200, a Kepler-era card, has neither.

Q: Which card has more memory?

A: The RTX 5000 has 16 GB of GDDR6 on a 256-bit bus with 448.0 GB/s of bandwidth. The K5200 has 8 GB of GDDR5 on the same bus width, delivering 192.3 GB/s.

Q: Which card needs more power?

A: The RTX 5000, with a 230 W TDP, one 6-pin and one 8-pin connector, and a suggested 550 W PSU. The K5200 runs at 150 W with a single 6-pin connector and a suggested 450 W PSU.

Q: Are the two cards physically different in size?

A: No. Both are dual-slot cards measuring 267 mm in length and 111 mm in height.

Q: Are either of these cards still in production?

A: No, both carry end-of-life status in the database.

Where Each One Wins

The Quadro RTX 5000 wins every measured performance category. It wins both head-to-head benchmark tests by margins exceeding 315 percent, it wins on theoretical throughput with 11.15 TFLOPS FP32 versus 3.553 TFLOPS, on pixel fill rate with 116.2 GPixel/s versus 37.01 GPixel/s, and on texture rate with 348.5 GTexel/s versus 148.0 GTexel/s. It also offers FP16 throughput at 22.30 TFLOPS in a 2:1 ratio, a capability the K5200 does not report at all. For compute-heavy professional work, modern API features, high-resolution multi-display output via DisplayPort 1.4a and USB Type-C, and large memory footprints, the RTX 5000 is the clear choice from the data.

The K5200 wins on efficiency and installation requirements. Its 150 W TDP is 80 W lower, its single 6-pin power connector is less demanding than the RTX 5000's dual-connector arrangement, and its 450 W suggested PSU is the more modest requirement of the two. It is the card to pick only when power delivery or connector availability rules out the RTX 5000, since it cannot match any measured performance figure in the database.

Specification Differences

The two cards differ across nearly every recorded specification. Chip and architecture: TU104 with Turing versus GK110B with Kepler. Process: 12 nm versus 28 nm. Transistors: 13,600 million versus 7,080 million. Die size: 545 mm² versus 561 mm². Density: 25.0M versus 12.6M per mm².

Clocks: 1620 MHz base and 1815 MHz boost versus 667 MHz base and 771 MHz boost; memory at 14 Gbps effective versus 6 Gbps effective. Memory: 16 GB GDDR6 at 448.0 GB/s versus 8 GB GDDR5 at 192.3 GB/s. Shader resources: 3,072 shading units and 64 ROPs versus 2,304 and 48, with TMUs tied at 192. The RTX 5000 adds 48 RT cores and 384 tensor cores; the K5200 has none.

Compute and fill rates: 11.15 TFLOPS FP32 and 22.30 TFLOPS FP16 versus 3.553 TFLOPS FP32 with no listed FP16. Pixel rate: 116.2 versus 37.01 GPixel/s. Texture rate: 348.5 versus 148.0 GTexel/s. Power: 230 W versus 150 W TDP, dual connectors versus one, 550 W versus 450 W suggested PSU. APIs: DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2) and Vulkan 1.4 versus DirectX 12 (11_1) and Vulkan 1.2.175. Outputs: four DisplayPort 1.4a plus USB Type-C versus two DVI plus two DisplayPort 1.2. Release timing: 2018 versus 2014, with launch MSRP recorded for the RTX 5000 at 2,299 USD and none recorded for the K5200. Identical between the two: bus interface, slot width, physical dimensions, foundry, OpenGL version, and end-of-life status.