Is there any place dedicated to talking about hardware?

[dzdiode]

Hi everyone, as the title said, I'm always confused when it comes to post on Octane Render forum since I own a legal license on my computer as artist but I can't be recognized as licenced on the forum since I don't have access to Otoy account of the original buyer...
If we want to talk about hardware and octane render.
Where would be the right place on the forum?
Thanks

[glimpse]

hi there =)

feel free to ask any questions here =) & I'll try to help You as I can .

GPU harware related subforum is for licenced users, so You migh not be able to reach =)
However, I can answer most of questions related to that matter =) drop them here!

[dzdiode]

Hi Tom,
Thanks for the help!
So I'm exploring Octane Render since October 2015, after a few tests, i didn't go far in the exploration cause I'm very focused on the rendering part, even if I do everything (modelling, animation, rendering...) and in October 2015 I had a GTX 970 wich was slow (for me) so I decided to go with a GTX 980 Ti, I got the EVGA Hybrid one due to the high temps I experienced on the 970.
GTX 980 Ti + 970 was confortable! For modelling, exploring, even finishing some scenes but not rendering them as final renders!
Actually, I'm focused on Fulldome content wich is very demanding on rendering, my final renders had to be in 4K between 30 and 60 Fps
After that, I sold my cards to get a pair of GTX 980 Ti AMP! EXTREME by ZOTAC.
Actually I still have them and on Octane bench they scores 278! I'm very impressed by the power, it's like the most powerful 980 Ti i owned. And I didn't overclocked them since they are factory overclocked and the temps are OK 80 degrees max. But their power consumption is high since it take two 8 pins.
Now, I'm thinking to upgrade my setup since I have to render 4K 30-60FPS immersive videos, and I'm very confused! Maxwell vs Pascal, on top of that, AMD! With the update of 3.0 to 3.1 (now I have 2.55 or something like that, we have to buy the update to 3.0).
I think my system can handle 6 or 7 GPU. I have an ASUS P9X79 WS i7 4930K 64gb DDR3 and the two 980 Ti AMP EXTREME.
Before the first question, I have to say that I'm a freelance artist like a lot of us here and I buy all my gear... So I really care about the penny's spanded on the gear.
Actually I have a small budget to add some power.
The question is, is it reasonable to get another two GTX 980 Ti AMP EXTREME wich will cost around 1200$ CAD (it's my actual budget) and render with the 4x980 Ti or waiting for Pascal support and check the benchmarks?
What I can expect from Pascal?
Cause I can sell my actual 980 Ti and by one Titan X wich cost 1600$ CAD.
I'm not thinking for the AMD solution cause we don't have any working solution yet and even more, the top amd cards are limited to 4gb vram due to HBM.

[whersmy]

Pascal is a bit uncertain, but the OR cloud might be your solution. That is coming in a few months though..but what the exact ETA is we dont know.......how many frames do you usually need?

If you can`t wait that long:
Dont OC, gpus are still fragile. 80C degrees is fine. Get MSI afterburner to increase fanspeed if needed for cooling.
Check your powerconsumption, you might need a psu in the range of 1300-1500W for upgrading well.
Check your rendertimes, if they are too high and you need, for example, double the speed -> you need to add two extra gpus on top of the two you already have.
Check your RAM, if you dont need more then 1,5GB, just need more speed on a budget, maybe even oldskool 580s/590s are your option. Those cards still are supernice. they go in EU for about 80E a piece secondhand.

[dzdiode]

Hi Whersmy,
The average number of frames for an immersive project (dome projection) is about 18000 frames (10 minutes at 30fps) in 4k
I just sold my 1000 watts 80+ Gold PSU and maybe tonight I pick a EVGA 1600 watts 80+ Gold from Newegg.
I know that I can save time on the scene optimization, since I deal with CPU renders for a decade and generally
, it's the last thing I do on a scene, just before i hit render.
When I check the benchmark of the GTX 690 (a lot of Cuda Cores and cheap one) it scores 1x 52 or 2x 102 (I don't know if the 2x is one card since it has two gpu's, if it is, so why Octane Bench also show 1x ? Cause I checked Show only one card).
So if you think that Pascal will not be super powerful, so the gtx 980 Ti stay in the sweet spot? Since it's powerful, has 6 gb vram, consume 250w, and can be found at around 500$.

[whersmy]

Octane bench also shows 1x shader units, when its a dual gpu card.

18k frames looks like quite a big project where Octane cloud might come in handy if not too expensive.
1600W is the right one yes. Brand evga is superb.
I cant say its a sweet spot since the timeframe for pascal and the optimizations results are not known yet.

[Nuge]

I am currently looking into getting a new system and additional render slave and i have a few questions regarding the slave hardware

Note I am using the C4D plugin

Do i need a decent CPU to do the compiling on the slave or is all of that work handled by the Client hardware?

Same question for the system Ram on the slave, do i need to match the ram i have in the client?

Thanks

Nuge

[whersmy]

Do i need a decent CPU to do the compiling on the slave or is all of that work handled by the Client hardware?
Thats a good question, I would say match it.

Same question for the system Ram on the slave, do i need to match the ram i have in the client?
Match the ram, as well if you are using out of core textures it`s needed

[dzdiode]

Nuge, just to tell you that I created this forum thread to talk about something that concern me, feel free to talk about the same concerns but if you come on my thread to talk about something totally different, it's not civilized at all.
Just create a thread and ask your question, we will help you as much as we can.

Whersmy, I just received the EVGA Supernova 1600w G2, amazing PSU!
I'm thinking to replace my gtx 980 Ti amp extreme by a reference model and replace the stock cooler with the EVGA HYBRID Cooler so I can stack the cards without heat issues since I'm planning to go with 4 cards so no need to an open air mining like frame...
Any date for the Pascal support?

[Nuge]

Dzdiode,


Sorry i didnt mean to be uncivilized, i saw Toms comment "feel free to ask any questions here =) & I'll try to help You as I can ." I didn't realize that was for your benefit only so i fired away. my mistake

Nuge.