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Can the NVIDIA RTX 4000 Ada Generation Laptop GPU run Llama Guard 4 12B?

62Good quality (B) · 62 of 100: how capable the model is at Q4_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 72/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking.

Yes, it runs well

Runs well. At Q4_K_M it needs about 8.9 GB of 12.0 GB usable and makes one decision in about 394 ms.

Best quant
Q4_K_M
Time per decision
394 ms
Decisions per second
2.5/s
Input assumed
512 tokens
Returns
Fixed labels

Best app to run it on the NVIDIA RTX 4000 Ada Generation Laptop GPU

On Windows

Sentence Transformers

Python library · runs on PyTorch (Transformers)

  • A few lines of Python with Transformers or Sentence Transformers; easiest for scripts and notebooks.

Get Sentence Transformers

On Linux

Docker Model Runner

Command line + local API · runs on llama.cpp, vLLM

  • Handy if you already work in Docker.
docker model run hf.co/meta-llama/Llama-Guard-4-12B
  • Sentence Transformers A few lines of Python with Transformers or Sentence Transformers; easiest for scripts and notebooks.

How we choose: the files published for this model, your operating system and GPU, whether it fits fully in memory, and published speed tests (MLX vs llama.cpp on Apple silicon, vLLM vs llama.cpp vs Ollama on NVIDIA). Details.

Download Llama Guard 4 12B

Original weights · Hugging Face

Full-precision files from Meta, for fine-tuning, vLLM, Transformers.

huggingface.co/meta-llama/Llama-Guard-4-12B (opens in a new tab)

Free Hugging Face account needed: request access on the model page, and Meta approves it (usually within minutes to a few hours).

Links checked 3 hours ago against Hugging Face, Ollama and GitHub.

How it’s rated

Quality 62Good quality (B) · 62 of 100: how capable the model is at Q4_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 72/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking.
How capable the model itself is at Q4_K_M, from its editorial quality tier scaled by the quantization or precision. It’s the same on any hardware that runs this variant. Scale: A+ 85+ · A 70+ · B 55+ · C 40+ · D under 40.
Runs Runs well
How well it runs on the NVIDIA RTX 4000 Ada Generation Laptop GPU: speed, capped by how well it fits in memory. Runs great: 30+ tokens/s (or near the image, video or decision speed target) · Runs well: 10+ tokens/s · Slow: 3+ tokens/s · Very slow: under 3 · Won’t run: doesn’t fit even with offload. A tight fit or RAM offload caps it at Runs well; heavy offload caps it at Slow.

Match score

To order lists, each result also gets a match score out of 100 from four parts. It favors the most capable model that still runs well.

PrecisionEditorial precision tier from the model’s published benchmarks, scaled by the quantization or precision used.28.2 / 45
Memory fitFull marks when everything sits in GPU memory; fewer when part spills to system RAM.25.0 / 25
SpeedTime for one decision against a 100 ms target: reading the input plus any tokens the model writes.7.6 / 15
ClarityHow easy the answer is to use in code: a probability or score earns the most, written feedback before a score the least.12.0 / 15
Match score72.8 / 100

The match score orders results; it is not shown as a grade. Quality and Runs are the two ratings in the tables.

Every quantization on the NVIDIA RTX 4000 Ada Generation Laptop GPU

Quant Memory needed Available Speed Runs Quality Download
Q4_K_M 8.9 GB 12.0 GB 394 ms Runs well 62Good quality (B) · 62 of 100: how capable the model is at Q4_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 72/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. All files (opens in a new tab)
Q5_K_M 10.1 GB 12.0 GB 422 ms Slow 64Good quality (B) · 64 of 100: how capable the model is at Q5_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 73/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. All files (opens in a new tab)
Q6_K 11.4 GB 12.0 GB 454 ms Slowtight fit 65Good quality (B) · 65 of 100: how capable the model is at Q6_K, whatever it runs on. Match score 72/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. All files (opens in a new tab)
Q8_0 14.3 GB 12.0 GB 829 ms Slowoffloads to RAM 66Good quality (B) · 66 of 100: how capable the model is at Q8_0, whatever it runs on. Match score 56/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. All files (opens in a new tab)
F16 25.6 GB 12.0 GB 2.8 s Very slowheavy RAM offload 66Good quality (B) · 66 of 100: how capable the model is at F16, whatever it runs on. Match score 48/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. Original weights (opens in a new tab)

Times are for one request with a 512-token input and about 6 tokens written. Batching servers process many requests at once.

Other hardware that runs it

Quick answers

How much memory does Llama Guard 4 12B need on the NVIDIA RTX 4000 Ada Generation Laptop GPU 12GB?

At Q4_K_M it needs about 8.9 GB. The NVIDIA RTX 4000 Ada Generation Laptop GPU 12GB has 12.0 GB usable.

How fast is Llama Guard 4 12B on the NVIDIA RTX 4000 Ada Generation Laptop GPU 12GB?

It makes one decision in about 394 ms at Q4_K_M, an estimate from the hardware and the size of the model.

Estimates come from published hardware specs and our open formulas, not from running the model on your machine. Real speed varies with runtime, drivers and settings. Numbers marked “Measured” come from a linked benchmark.

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