mix and match GPUs? also a new motherboard?

[aleciselin]

I'm wondering if Octane supports GPUs that aren't at all the same. My PC was prebuilt when I bought it so it only supports one Graphics card. At the time, multiple gpu's didn't seem necessary as long As I could just get one very good gpu in there. It's a pretty powerful PC other than being a little limited because of the number of ports and it being a mid tower. so I'm just trying to figure out what an upgrade would look like. Also I don't know if I would be able to transfer my i7 chip to a different board. If I can't then all of this is completely impractical.

right now I have a gigabyte windforce 970 in my machine. a new motherboard and a new case would be around $550 (maybe I would also need a new PSU, and new fans?)
If I could upgrade the board, I'd like to continue using my gigabyte 970. would I be able to plugin say a 980 and use it in conjunction with the 970? does it need to be the exact same brand and model as the first card. Does it need an SLI bridge. I don't know if Octane would need any of that.

I guess I'm not really talking upgrade, it's more like frankensteining a new PC out of the one I have now. Normally I would say multiple gpus isn't worth all this trouble. but from what I've read, Octane performance scales up really well with more gpus.

[glimpse]

hi, Aleciselin.

as for i7 or any other CPU.. You can only reuse it if You buy the motherboard from the same generation. To give You any advice, it would be better if You could list Your components with exact models.

You can totaly use different GPUs (brand doesn't matter at all). Speed is combined from different models & scalling is nearly perfect. One thing to remember is that if You have let's say 4GB card & add another with 6GB, You will only see 4GB of usable vram if You render with both cards.

Now ideal thing is to have separate GPU for screen + other tasks (let's say photoshop acceleration & such) and then something dedicated only for rendering. With such solution You can render in the background without feeling any lag on Your computer, so even older card with lower amount of vram might end up prety handy.

As a side note. It's if You do not have computer with too much of free PCIe slots - simply buy a bit better/faster GPUs this way You do not need too much of expansion slots. Investing into better motherboard is wise move (You can get older generation, used motherboards prety cheap if You try to save some cash =)

[aleciselin]

Thanks for the reply.

I've done a little more research since posting this question. I realized that about the CPU. Upgrading the motherboard without doing the CPU would be a pretty big waste of money and effort. It's really best to do them both at the same time. Otherwise I'd be missing a good chance to double my max Ram capacity.

I also managed to test out Octane a little bit. I was pleasently surprised at how well the real time render inside of C4D was able to remain realtime. Even with high amounts of reflections, bump channels, DOF, and post filters turned on. It never really started to lag very much. Coming from the built in renderer where I'm used to changing one parameter and having to wait 1-2 minutes to see the result, I was really surprised by what Octane could do just by using the GPU instead of the CPU.

So for now I think I am good to go as I am. I will still do these upgrades eventually. But I think I should wait until I get much better at using octane so I can have some really heavy projects to justify the upgrade.

[AZO9]

'' You can totaly use different GPUs (brand doesn't matter at all). Speed is combined from different models & scalling is nearly perfect. One thing to remember is that if You have let's say 4GB card & add another with 6GB, You will only see 4GB of usable vram if You render with both cards.''

So I have a gtx 1070 (recently purchased) and a gtx 590 (1 video card with 2gpus) 590 first Gpu connected with my screen and 590 second Gpu with gtx 1070 used for rendering. The problem is that I have only 1,5 gb of vram available for textures of my total 11 (590-3 and 1070-8) the only way I found to raise it to 8 gb is to disable totally my gtx 590 from preferences menu tab so only 1070 is active with he 8gb. Is there any way with both cards enabled to raise my available ram for textures?