NVIDIA Quadro P5200 Max-Q

NVIDIA Quadro P5200 Max-Q is a mobile workstation-class GPU based on the Pascal architecture, fabricated on TSMC's 16 nm process. It packs 7,200 million transistors onto a 314 mm² die, yielding a transistor density of 22.9M per square millimeter. The chip, designated GP104, features 2,560 shading units, 160 texture mapping units, and 64 raster operation pipelines. Its performance envelope is defined by a 100 W TDP, which places it in a power-constrained segment of the mobile market, directly influencing its thermal and power delivery requirements.

Power and Cooling

The Quadro P5200 Max-Q carries a 100 W TDP, a figure that dictates its thermal design and system integration. This power draw is modest for a chip with 2,560 CUDA cores, reflecting the Max-Q engineering focus on efficiency over raw throughput. Because the card is an MXM Module with a slot width of "MXM-B (3.0)", it is not a self-contained expansion card but rather a replaceable module designed for laptops and portable workstations. The bus interface is MXM-B (3.0), which determines the electrical and mechanical mating to the host system.

No dedicated power connectors are required, as the module draws all its power through the MXM slot itself. This means the host laptop's power delivery system, not a standalone PSU, must supply the necessary current. Consequently, there is no specific PSU recommendation; the system's existing power adapter and voltage regulator modules must handle the 100 W load. The absence of external connectors simplifies installation but places a hard limit on overclocking or sustained boost behavior. For cooling, a capable air cooler designed for the MXM form factor is expected, given the 100 W dissipation requirement; liquid cooling is possible but not implied by the slot design. The pixel rate is 100.4 GPixel/s and the texture rate is 251.0 GTexel/s, both of which are sustained only if thermals allow the 1569 MHz boost clock to be held.

Ray Tracing and Feature Set

This GPU is built on the Pascal architecture, which predates dedicated ray tracing and tensor core hardware. The fact pack explicitly lists no RT cores and no tensor cores, meaning the P5200 Max-Q relies entirely on traditional rasterization and compute shaders for any ray tracing workloads. DirectX 12 (12_1) support is present, which includes the feature level for conservative rasterization and rasterizer-ordered views, but hardware-accelerated ray tracing via DXR is not a functional capability. Similarly, Vulkan 1.4 is supported, allowing for advanced graphics and compute APIs, but again without the dedicated hardware acceleration found in newer architectures. OpenGL 4.6 is also available, ensuring compatibility with legacy professional applications.

The FP32 throughput is rated at 8.033 TFLOPS, which is the primary compute metric for most workstation tasks. FP16 performance is severely limited at 125.5 GFLOPS (1:64), indicating that this GPU is not optimized for half-precision workloads common in AI inference or certain scientific simulations. The memory subsystem comprises 16 GB of GDDR5 on a 256-bit bus, delivering 230.9 GB/s of bandwidth. The memory clock is 1804 MHz, with an effective data rate of 7.2 Gbps. This capacity is sufficient for large datasets and high-resolution textures, but the bandwidth is modest by modern standards.

Benchmark Performance

The benchmark data for the Quadro P5200 Max-Q is sparse, with an average benchmark score of 0 and no individual benchmark entries provided. Its percentile ranking against all GPUs is 50, meaning it sits exactly at the median of the performance distribution. This is a critical data point: half of all GPUs in the database are slower, and half are faster. However, without specific rival scores or percentage deltas, a precise numerical comparison cannot be constructed from the fact pack. The nearestRivals array is empty, so no direct competitor analysis is possible. The FP32 compute of 8.033 TFLOPS serves as the primary raw performance indicator; when combined with the 100 W TDP, it yields an efficiency of roughly 80 GFLOPS per watt. The memory bandwidth of 230.9 GB/s suggests that compute-heavy tasks, such as rendering or simulation, will be the primary beneficiaries, while memory-bound workloads may be limited by the 256-bit bus width.

How It Compares

Because the nearestRivals field is empty, this section cannot provide specific comparisons to named competitors. The data indicates that the P5200 Max-Q occupies the 50th percentile, which places it in the middle of the field. This suggests that it is neither a performance leader nor a laggard; it is a balanced mid-range option in the context of all GPUs. Given the Pascal architecture and its 2018 release date, it is likely outperformed by newer Turing and Ampere mobile parts, but it also holds an advantage over older Maxwell and Kepler chips. The 16 GB memory capacity is a strong point, as many contemporary rivals in the same power class may offer less. The lack of RT and tensor cores is a clear differentiator against newer competitors that include such hardware, meaning the P5200 Max-Q will lose ground in ray-traced workloads despite holding its own in traditional rasterization.

Who Should Consider It

The Quadro P5200 Max-Q is suited for users whose primary workloads are compute-heavy and do not require hardware ray tracing. The 8.033 TFLOPS FP32 performance and 16 GB VRAM make it viable for GPU-accelerated rendering, finite element analysis, and scientific computing at resolutions up to 1080p or 1440p, depending on the application's memory footprint. The 230.9 GB/s bandwidth is adequate for feeding the 2,560 cores in most professional workloads, though it may become a bottleneck in scenes with extreme texture detail or large simulation grids. The 50th percentile ranking indicates that users can expect average performance relative to the entire GPU landscape; this is not a top-tier part for high-refresh-rate gaming or 4K rendering, but it is more than capable for professional tasks at moderate settings. Given the 100 W TDP, it is best deployed in thin-and-light mobile workstations where power efficiency is prioritized over absolute speed. Users who require ray tracing capabilities or half-precision compute should look to newer architectures, as this part lacks both RT cores and meaningful FP16 support. For those running legacy OpenGL 4.6 or DirectX 12 (12_1) applications, the P5200 Max-Q provides a stable and compatible platform, but its end-of-life production status suggests that future driver optimizations will be limited.