Mac Pro compatibility.

[stefano86]

Hi,

I'm about to buy a Mac Pro. I was wondering if they were any problems with the AMD Pro 300D and Octane Render.

Thx.

Stefano

[glimpse]

hi,

OctaneRender is CUDA based app & it's not working on AMD cards for now, only version 3 is going to bring compatability with those =) so for now if You would like to use "trashbin", You need thunderbolt expander & some CUDA capable cards hooked.

[stefano86]

Hi,

Thx for the answer! When would version 3 come out?

Stefano

[J.C]

The v3 should be out later this year.

300D in a mac pro has only 2GB of ram. With this configuration you'll not play much. Sorry to tell but it's an expansive toy. You should buy a PC with much powerfull, nvidia gtx 980 which can have 6"giga of ram.

[10Polarbears]

For more AMD on macPro D700 comments:
http://render.otoy.com/forum/viewtopic. ... 16#p226674

As for release of v3 something like 3-5 months with probable open beta before then.

[Stonefield]

Sadly, Apple has abandoned power users in favor of toys for the consumer market. Their lackluster product line is a complete joke for serious applications like 3D modeling, CAD/CAM or Animation. They prefer to pump the market full of iPhones and iPads and design super slick statement computers that are sealed boxes that can't be upgraded, loaded with outdated processors and video cards that can't even sustain 4K gaming, let alone professional work.

Apples sole jewel is their great OS. Their hardware engineers would have all been fired by a competent Steve Jobs, who demanded excellence above expectation at every turn. Now, all we get are exquisitely packaged pretty aluminum boxes containing overpriced, self limiting media consumption devices.

IMHO ignore Apple products until someone with vision shows up to drive it. Microsoft is even worse, being at best a blind brain damaged giant incapable of delivering anything without bugs so significant that missing a single weekly patch may leave you dead in the water.... And obviously, since this has been the case for decades, one has to assume obsolescence and irrelevance are the de facto standard operating model at MS.

Learn Linux. It's not as simple, slick or pretty... But its stability will blow you away and the ability to custom build what you want based on need and cost will put you miles ahead of your competition who must struggle with bad hardware powered by inept operating systems.

[FrankPooleFloating]

My last Mac was a PowerPC 8600... Never looked back. Had multiple dual-processor PCs between that Mac and my current PC. Even when Mr Jobs was still with us, their top of the line stuff was always quickly outdone by bleeding edge PC stuff, imho. Yes, they innovated with many, many things like Firewire, etc, but because of the much smaller slice of the pie, they just never had anything, at any kind of reasonable price, that compelled me to even think about going back...

My Win7Pro x64 is solid bro. Almost never have crashes. Linux has never compelled me either, to go that route. In the end, when you have a stable-high-end-windows-pc, you get to have your cake and eat it too. And the thought of not being able to pick and choose every last nut and bolt that goes into my workstations is utterly unthinkable, as is the idea of not building it myself.

And Mac-based 3D artists have always had to compromise, and not have the full spectrum of 3D apps available to them... so there is that, too.

Sorry stefano86, but Macs just suck for professional 3D artists. In my most humble opinion.

[natemac00]

I'm a professional 3D designer and love my Mac. I also use a Trashcan Mac Pro. I recently purchased/built a eGPU for the Mac Pro. I tossed a 980 Ti into and it's been working wonderful. It's a pain to have an external box, and just kinda dumb, but it is a desktop so who cares, and you can use the AMD build in cards to drive your monitors and the eGPU to render so you wont have any lag while you're working and rendering.

[FrankPooleFloating]

You again.. we gotta stop meeting this way.

[nibbler]

Hi all,


Had the same issue - this is how I got my "Mac Environment" got run, without any extensions.

Its "special" but it works brilliant:

• Buy one ore more old Mac Pro (Version 5,1. Mid 2010) . It is the Alu/silver "Tower Version".
• buy One ore two NVIDIA Titan X (evga PC versions works fine, otherwise "hazzle free" macvidcards version)*
• buy a sufficient power supply (like "be quiet" dark power pro; 850Watt) to operate the GPUs
• insert the Titan X
• connect the power supply with the titan x's power inserts
• install newest Cuda and Nvidia Display (Quadro) for OSX drivers. **
• install octane and all your otoy plugins you need (my: cinema 4d and poser)
• Enjoy a powerfull GPU Realtime Rendering Device in outstanding quality with more than 6000 Cores and 2x12GB VRAM!!!

It is a bit special, but WORKS fine. Fortunately OSX supports this and NVIDIA delivers the drivers! (Thanx to both!!!)

Heavy duty the last 1,5 yrs. Powerfull tool. Have this running with two systems (1st Macpro with 2 x titan X, and a second Macpro with 2 x titan Black). Even Windows / Bootcamp works excellent (PC Gaming on a Mac in "Ultra" possible

System 1 Setup:
Mac Pro (Mid¬2010) ;
2 x 2,4 GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon;
2 x NVIDIA GeForce GTX TITAN X 12287 MB ;
OSX 10.10.4

*
if you want to see the startscreen on bootup (eg to choose between different OS or startup disks), you need a "flashed" modified Titan X, like those of http://www.macvidcards.com.

If you want to use "PC" standard Nvidia Titan (nonflashed) than you have to manage to operate initially with an additional amd card (coming installed with your macpro). First all driver installation has to be done with this one AMD GPU preinstalled as the "monitor/screen" version and at the beginning only ONE titan as a second device. The titan will not work unless the NVIDIA MACDriver is installed (you have to check this in a checkbox within the OSX systemsettings: Check NVIDIA DRIVER instead of OSX DEFAULT Driver (unchecked).

**
After installation of all drivers and Enabling the Nvidia Drivers in OSX systemsetting the ATI can be removed and the additional Titan X can be installed. It wil then work with two NVIDIA GPUs installed. (Without bootup startscreen shown, when using "normal" nvidia "PC" cards instead of flashed "macvideocard" version.)



ANOTHER OPTION:

For those, who wants a "play-it-safe"-triple-cost-version: you can buy a 100% MacPro compatible NVIDIA QUADRO Version. Natively. Coming with all drivers. Needs no additional power supply, works well within the macpro, shows screen on bootup. Up to 2 Quadros can be installed.

The disadvantage (in my oppinion):
– COST: NVIDIA Quadros GPUs are made for professional CAD/CAM and are far mor expensive, then "traditional" gaming GPUS made by NVIDIA
– PERFORMANCE: due to the lack of "power" (the MacPro internal powersupply is only able to hande 2 "low power consumption" GPUs) the GPUs performance is not comparable to the "Titan X" Option. Its simply far slower.

(I putted one NVIDIA Quadro 500 into my system, worked solid and fine. But only at 10% percent of the performance of the Titan Black.)

Advantage:
– Plug and Play, hazzlefree

For those who care:
I tested a Titan Z in the Mac Pro – coudnt get it run. Hands off