Granite 4.2 30B on NVIDIA RTX A5000 24 GB
29.277B on 24 GB at 768 GB/s. Hardware details · Model details
Marginal. Granite 4.2 30B fits on NVIDIA RTX A5000 24 GB at the recommended
Q4_K_M configuration, requiring approximately 20.5 GB at 8K context. Practical context capacity is 8K.CompatibilityBorderline
Calculated fit
Yes
Calculated Uses 90-97% of usable memory. Likely to load but fragile under load or long context.
Recommended quantization
Q4_K_M
Calculated gguf
Memory required
20.5 GB
Calculated of 22.1 GB usable — 93%
Max practical context
8K
Calculated model supports 128K
Memory budget at 8K context
Model weights ⓘ
17.0 GB Calculated
KV cache ⓘ
2.0 GB Calculated
Runtime overhead ⓘ
1.5 GB Estimated
Total required
20.5 GB Calculated
Headroom ⓘ
1.5 GB Calculated
Only a borderline fit (93% of usable memory). Expect to run headless and keep the context short.
Discrete GPU: 24 GB of VRAM, of which we assume 92% is usable after driver and context overhead.
Borderline fit. It may load, but you will have little room for a longer context, a second process, or a desktop session.
Performance
Estimated performance · recommended Q4_K_M
Decode, prefill and TTFT below are estimates for Q4_K_M. We do not have a comparable Q4_K_M measurement on this machine.
Estimated decode
—
Estimated Q4_K_M; calculated range
Estimated prefill
—
Estimated Q4_K_M; calculated range
Estimated TTFT at 8K
—
Estimated Q4_K_M; calculated range
Hardware load reference
230 W
Official spec hardware TDP; not this model run
No throughput figures for this configuration. We do not estimate performance for a model that cannot load.
How the estimate is calculated
- Decode: reading 29.3B active parameters at 4.85 bits/weight takes 33.02 ms at 768 GB/s x 70% achieved efficiency.
- No FP16 compute figure for this hardware, so prefill cannot be estimated.
- This is a calculated estimate, not a measurement. It assumes a single request, a short prompt, no speculative decoding and a warm model already resident in memory.
Estimator version estimator_v1. Stored with every estimated row so old estimates can be regenerated when the model improves.
Submit a benchmarkSubmissions stay pending until reviewed.
This model at other quantizations on this machine
| Quantization | Resident | Disk | Total needed | Utilisation | Fit | Max context |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Q4_K_Mrecommended | 17.0 GB | 17.0 GB | 20.5 GB | 93% | Borderline | 8K |
Q5_K_M | 20.0 GB | 20.0 GB | 23.6 GB | 107% | Does not fit | 0 |
Q8_0 | 29.5 GB | 29.5 GB | 33.4 GB | 151% | Does not fit | 0 |
BF16 | 54.5 GB | 54.5 GB | 59.2 GB | 268% | Does not fit | 0 |
Cost of running Granite 4.2 30B on this machineUnited States (federal) · C corporation · 8h/day
Monthly economic cost
$1
Calculated after tax
Codex/Claude Code
$100/mo
≈ $100/mo · local is $99 less
Net cash at purchase
$0
Calculated VAT not reclaimable
Total over 5 years
$80
Calculated after tax, after resale
Cost per USD/1M tokens
—
Calculated
The $100 comparison uses the Codex Pro 5x / Claude Max 5x plans. A fixed planning conversion is used for USD. This compares monthly spend only: subscriptions have usage limits, local hardware has different capabilities and constraints, and taxes or regional pricing may change the charged amount. Prices checked 7 September 2026.
Monthly breakdown
| Depreciation 0 over 5 years, straight-line to a 0 residual | $0.00 |
| Electricity 12.0 kWh/month at 0.140/kWh | $1.68 |
| Monthly cost before tax | $1.68 |
| Electricity tax shield Running costs are deductible business expenses | −$0.35 |
| Monthly economic cost after tax | $1.33 |
Three different numbers, deliberately
Cash cost
$0
Money that leaves the bank account on day one, net of reclaimable VAT.
Accounting depreciation
$0.00/month
$0 written down over 5 years to a $0 residual.
After-tax economic cost
$1.33/month
Depreciation plus running costs plus cost of capital, less the tax those deductions save. This is the figure to compare between machines.
Assumptions and sources (verified 2026-09-07)
VAT rate
0% Official spec
VAT recoverable
0% Official spec
Federal C-corporation estimate at the flat 21% rate. Pass-through entities should use the sole-proprietor estimate as a rougher proxy.
Effective deduction rate
21.00% Calculated
Headline marginal rate 21.00%.
Depreciation
5 years, straight-line Assumption
Residual value
$0 (15%) Assumption
Two GPU generations later, the card is worth a fraction of its list price.
Electricity
$0.140/kWh Assumption
Average power draw
68 W Calculated
Load 230 W for 20% of powered hours, idle 28 W for the rest — a machine that is on is not generating tokens the whole time.
Investment allowances
§179 100.0% Official spec
Worth $0 in total — first-year expensing that replaces later tax depreciation.
Cost of capital
not applied Assumption
- VAT rate: No US federal VAT · verified 2026-09-07
- Marginal tax rate: IRS Publication 542 — Corporations · verified 2026-09-07
- VAT recoverable fraction: site assumption · verified 2026-09-07
- Useful life: IRS Publication 946 — How To Depreciate Property · verified 2026-09-07
- Electricity price: Site assumption · verified 2026-09-07
Federal planning estimate only, not tax advice. State and local income tax, sales/use tax and incentives are excluded. It assumes 100% business use, a Section 179 election, enough business income to use it, and that the full annual limit remains available.
Granite 4.2 30B on other hardware
| Hardware | Decode | Price | Fit |
|---|---|---|---|
| NVIDIA DGX H200 (8x H200, 1,128 GB) | ~323–465 t/s | $359,430 * | Comfortable |
| Quad RTX 5090 workstation (4x 32 GB) | ~72.1–104 t/s | $12,611 * | Comfortable |
| Lenovo ThinkStation PX (4x RTX PRO 6000, 384 GB) | ~63.1–90.7 t/s | $58,553 * | Comfortable |
| RTX 5090 workstation (1x 32 GB) | ~61.6–88.7 t/s | $3,332 * | Comfortable |
| Dual RTX 5090 workstation (2x 32 GB) | ~48.1–69.2 t/s | $5,854 * | Comfortable |
| Dell Precision 7960 Rack (2x RTX PRO 6000, 192 GB) | ~44–63.4 t/s | $36,663 * | Comfortable |
Nearest alternatives to the NVIDIA RTX A5000 24 GB
Granite 4.2 30B on GeForce RTX 3090 Ti 24 GB24 GBGranite 4.2 30B on NVIDIA Tesla P40 24 GB24 GBGranite 4.2 30B on RTX 3090 workstation (Ryzen 9 7950X, 64 GB)24 GBGranite 4.2 30B on Used RTX 4090 workstation (24 GB)24 GBGranite 4.2 30B on NVIDIA RTX 5000 Ada 32 GB32 GB
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