OTOY Forums

I have already reported the last sentence from core devs about 2022.1 on Intel/AMD Macs, but it worths to link it again:
viewtopic.php?f=33&t=80156#p414656

ciao,
Beppe

bepeg4d wrote:I have already reported the last sentence from core devs about 2022.1 on Intel/AMD Macs, but it worths to link it again:
viewtopic.php?f=33&t=80156#p414656

ciao,
Beppe

So no progress to report in nearly 2 months. It sounds to me like a "still maybe but probably not" on any future Intel/AMD Mac support, and Octane X is done.
This makes me really sad. I'm wondering how long I should keep paying for hope.

SRCOBB wrote:So no progress to report in nearly 2 months. It sounds to me like a "still maybe but probably not" on any future Intel/AMD Mac support, and Octane X is done.
This makes me really sad. I'm wondering how long I should keep paying for hope.

Logging on to see where we are at with non-M1. It's not looking good is it.
Built a Hackintosh to house my 2 x AMD cards

No new updates about intel/AMD support, whom currently has the fastest cards for MAC users. I understand why Apple is dropping AMD but I'm so disappointed in OTOY for dropping it completely. They have supported macOS 10.13 running CUDA for years and yet dropping 6xxx series after 2 years? Broken promises and lies all around, where is the MAC + PC network rendering support? we surely do need it since these m1/m2 chips are slow as heck. I'm not sure why OTOY even wasted their time creating a macOS version, which is the slowest renderer out of all the AMD supported ones because it only supports m1/m2, CYCLES and REDSHIFT are all faster because they support AMDs 6xxx series.

leonthegod wrote:No new updates about intel/AMD support, whom currently has the fastest cards for MAC users. I understand why Apple is dropping AMD but I'm so disappointed in OTOY for dropping it completely. They have supported macOS 10.13 running CUDA for years and yet dropping 6xxx series after 2 years? Broken promises and lies all around, where is the MAC + PC network rendering support? we surely do need it since these m1/m2 chips are slow as heck. I'm not sure why OTOY even wasted their time creating a macOS version, which is the slowest renderer out of all the AMD supported ones because it only supports m1/m2, CYCLES and REDSHIFT are all faster because they support AMDs 6xxx series.

Cycles and Redshift may be profoundly different than Octane, under the hood, or Octane may rely heavily on a particular set of functions that just can't be worked around without low level support in the OS. If Apple chooses not to support the AMD hardware that way, there's not much OTOY can do about it.

I'm speaking only from long-past development experience, not from any inside knowledge of this particular situation. My point is that from the outside, it's easy to say, "You don't care about your customers because you won't support X Y and Z!" Actually getting all the hardware, software, and driver puzzle pieces to fit together can be insanely difficult. Sometimes it's not practical, or even impossible without completely starting over. Yes, that totally stinks, but that's the reality of complex systems integration. Jules & Co. have to make choices with limited available assets and limited knowledge of the future, just like the rest of us.

frankmci wrote:

leonthegod wrote:No new updates about intel/AMD support, whom currently has the fastest cards for MAC users. I understand why Apple is dropping AMD but I'm so disappointed in OTOY for dropping it completely. They have supported macOS 10.13 running CUDA for years and yet dropping 6xxx series after 2 years? Broken promises and lies all around, where is the MAC + PC network rendering support? we surely do need it since these m1/m2 chips are slow as heck. I'm not sure why OTOY even wasted their time creating a macOS version, which is the slowest renderer out of all the AMD supported ones because it only supports m1/m2, CYCLES and REDSHIFT are all faster because they support AMDs 6xxx series.

Cycles and Redshift may be profoundly different than Octane, under the hood, or Octane may rely heavily on a particular set of functions that just can't be worked around without low level support in the OS. If Apple chooses not to support the AMD hardware that way, there's not much OTOY can do about it.

I'm speaking only from long-past development experience, not from any inside knowledge of this particular situation. My point is that from the outside, it's easy to say, "You don't care about your customers because you won't support X Y and Z!" Actually getting all the hardware, software, and driver puzzle pieces to fit together can be insanely difficult. Sometimes it's not practical, or even impossible without completely starting over. Yes, that totally stinks, but that's the reality of complex systems integration. Jules & Co. have to make choices with limited available assets and limited knowledge of the future, just like the rest of us.

The intricacies on how it works isn't the problem of the customers. They charged me full price for software updates what won't ever come. It was easy for them to take my money and removing support for devices under 2 years old is bad business. These are the facts, I don't need to understand how their company is ran, I am not CEO. We as the consumers want a working product, they have the MAC PRO purchase page still up, yet it's EOL.

Here is what I'd like to know right now. Is it possible to get a simple update to Octane X so that I can use it in C4D 2023?
I'm not even asking for new functions or development right now, I'd just like to use my preferred renderer in the latest version of my preferred software (still way faster than Redshift for me) ...or are we done at PR14?

leonthegod wrote:The intricacies on how it works isn't the problem of the customers. They charged me full price for software updates what won't ever come. It was easy for them to take my money and removing support for devices under 2 years old is bad business. These are the facts, I don't need to understand how their company is ran, I am not CEO. We as the consumers want a working product, they have the MAC PRO purchase page still up, yet it's EOL.

Sure it's the problem of the customers. It's the real world we live in. That is a fact. Welcome to capitalism. AMD/Apple hardware compatibility may be a technically insurmountable problem, it may be a business decision, it may be somewhere in between. Otoy may lose you as a customer, and if it ticks off enough people, the company may develop a bad reputation, lose profitability and ultimately go bankrupt. Business is messy, difficult, and often wildly unfair. If you are really motivated maybe you can work up a class action suit and hasten their corporate demise. I doubt it would succeed, though, if Otoy can prove that the product worked as advertised at the time of purchase. That's their only legal obligation unless otherwise explicitly stated in a contract.

You might want to ask for a refund for the Octane portion of your purchase. That's about all that can be reasonably expected from Otoy, whatever the reason for the AMD situation. The risk of investing early in new tech that winds up going nowhere is part of working in a rapidly changing industry like ours. You took a gamble, which seemed like a reasonable one at the time, but it may not go in your favor. Yes, that undeniably sucks.

I've made quite a few of those gambles over the years, and I've lost several of them. The first few really stung, but it eventually became clear that it's just part of working in this field on the leading edge. My own strategy, developed over the last thirty years, is to be content working comfortably behind that edge. It's just not worth the slight advantage that winning those particularly risky bets might provide. Purchases are based on actual shipping product that can pay for itself in production, not future projections of what might be coming down the line if everything works out. I find that somewhere between one and three years behind the bleeding edge works just fine for the vast majority of clients and projects. A reliable, well understood set of tools may not be flashy, but they also don't crap out unexpectedly when the heat is on, or require lots of additional late-night R & D for each new project.

A reliable, well understood set of tools may not be flashy, but they also don't crap out unexpectedly when the heat is on, or require lots of additional late-night R & D for each new project.

Sure, sure. Caveat emptor.

But it also seems like this would've been really good advice for Otoy to follow. They've had three years now to develop a well understood set of tools that don't crap out unexpectedly when the heat is on. They haven't. It has to be worth noting that Octane X has never been fully functional with pixel parity to the other releases. Rendering on any platform, any device? Nope. Instead they've spent lots of extra R&D time removing perfectly functional features in an attempt to chase the newest and latest shiny thing.

Given the track record thus far, and knowing Apple's fickleness, it wouldn't surprise me to see Apple ditch silicon or once again change directions sometime in the next 18 months. But that's perfectly okay, because instead of giving the customers a complete, functional, fully-integrated, cross-platform rendering solution, Otoy will once again strip features out so that they can spend all their time chasing the next shiny thing.

If you really want to talk capitalism, Otoy has never had to pay for the productive knowledge of their customer base. Thus far they've been able to exploit it, not only for building up a portfolio of what Octane can do, but as a community of creatives who not only help each other out without any investment from Otoy, but who believed in the potential of the renderer and have paid through their licenses to keep development moving forward. At some point Otoy has to actually listen to their customers, or all that productive knowledge goes away. What happens when people put their time in to learn Redshift or Cycles or something else? What happens when all the cool renders are being made with other renderers? What happens when there's no one left to help newbies learn Octane and all the advice on the forums is for features that got removed or versions so old they're not recognizable?

You're assuming that all the risk is the customer's— and I'm sure Otoy would like that to be the case— but they're the ones who are taking the risk. All we've ever asked for is a reliable, well understood set of tools that doesn't crap out unexpectedly when the heat is on— something that's looking more and more certain that Otoy cannot or will not deliver.

frankmci wrote:

leonthegod wrote:The intricacies on how it works isn't the problem of the customers. They charged me full price for software updates what won't ever come. It was easy for them to take my money and removing support for devices under 2 years old is bad business. These are the facts, I don't need to understand how their company is ran, I am not CEO. We as the consumers want a working product, they have the MAC PRO purchase page still up, yet it's EOL.

Sure it's the problem of the customers. It's the real world we live in. That is a fact. Welcome to capitalism. AMD/Apple hardware compatibility may be a technically insurmountable problem, it may be a business decision, it may be somewhere in between. Otoy may lose you as a customer, and if it ticks off enough people, the company may develop a bad reputation, lose profitability and ultimately go bankrupt. Business is messy, difficult, and often wildly unfair. If you are really motivated maybe you can work up a class action suit and hasten their corporate demise. I doubt it would succeed, though, if Otoy can prove that the product worked as advertised at the time of purchase. That's their only legal obligation unless otherwise explicitly stated in a contract.

You might want to ask for a refund for the Octane portion of your purchase. That's about all that can be reasonably expected from Otoy, whatever the reason for the AMD situation. The risk of investing early in new tech that winds up going nowhere is part of working in a rapidly changing industry like ours. You took a gamble, which seemed like a reasonable one at the time, but it may not go in your favor. Yes, that undeniably sucks.

I've made quite a few of those gambles over the years, and I've lost several of them. The first few really stung, but it eventually became clear that it's just part of working in this field on the leading edge. My own strategy, developed over the last thirty years, is to be content working comfortably behind that edge. It's just not worth the slight advantage that winning those particularly risky bets might provide. Purchases are based on actual shipping product that can pay for itself in production, not future projections of what might be coming down the line if everything works out. I find that somewhere between one and three years behind the bleeding edge works just fine for the vast majority of clients and projects. A reliable, well understood set of tools may not be flashy, but they also don't crap out unexpectedly when the heat is on, or require lots of additional late-night R & D for each new project.

You seem to misunderstand my stance on the Octane on Mac situation. I didn't invest macOS for 3d rendering that's what PCs are for, it was for stability. Otoy did fine on Mac CUDA until Nvidia pulled the plug with Apple. Now Apple plugged the plug on AMD fair enough. Octane X isn't ready for Mac that's all I needed to know.