topic Re: AC10 rendering with Quad core in Installation & update

AC10 rendering with Quad core

Anonymous — Fri, 10 Aug 2007 21:31:45 GMT

We've just built a PC with the following with the view of using it for rendering:

Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 2.4GHz
2GB PC6400
XP Pro 32bit

It came as a bit of a surprise that, even though the new setup managed to fully render a large-ish model, it actually took longer to render than the same model on a single core P4 3GHz (that ended up giving up with "insufficient memory" error message). I know that the clock speed has a bit to do with it, but surely Lightworks would be able to make more use of the 4 cores?

I'd read a page saying that Lightworks is forced as a single processor application when anti-aliasing is set to best and realistic sun is used. Is there any way around this and still get decent results?

Re: AC10 rendering with Quad core

Karl Ottenstein — Fri, 10 Aug 2007 23:51:35 GMT

2 GB is kind of skimpy for 4 processors / cores ( = 512 MB each, if life were average, which it isn't).

I'm sure you've read this:
http://www.archicadwiki.com/Multiprocessing

and this:
http://www.archicadwiki.com/LightWorks

based on your comments on the LW settings.

You might download a free trial version of Artlantis Studio and compare the results of the same model (just Save from the 3D window as ATL) to compare times and antialiasing settings. AFAIK, Artlantis uses as many processors as are available nearly all of the time. And, the batch rendering ability is a real plus too.

Not really the answer you were looking for...

Karl

Re: AC10 rendering with Quad core

Anonymous — Mon, 13 Aug 2007 10:33:35 GMT

I hooked up more RAM to the system to get it up to 4GB, of which XP only sees 3.25GB. Rendering time has improved slightly, though the most marked difference was with marked reduced number of light sources set in the sun objects.

I'll try and see how things work with ARTLantis next. Hopefully it uses multi-core processors better than Lightworks.

It is a bit annoying when the blurb on Lightworks website says how their new version 7.7 works up to 3-4 times faster on quad-core (see http://www.lightworkdesign.com/products/latestrelease.htm), but not so with what comes with AC10. Or am I getting the wrong end of the stick and they're completely different animals..?

Re: AC10 rendering with Quad core

Mishi — Mon, 13 Aug 2007 20:29:09 GMT

hi,

speaking of LWS. This comes up so many times now how badly it works in archicad regarding multiprocessor. We also have so many issues with it speedwise. It's good but not everything.
My question would be. Does anyone know if GS implemented in AC11 the 7.7 LWS engine.
I could take a wild guess and state they are using the old 6.x rendering engine and didn't buy the rights for the new one and put it into 11 and/or 10.
How can you check the LWS engine version?

Re: AC10 rendering with Quad core

Anonymous — Tue, 14 Aug 2007 09:05:25 GMT

My question would be. Does anyone know if GS implemented in AC11 the 7.7 LWS engine.
I could take a wild guess and state they are using the old 6.x rendering engine and didn't buy the rights for the new one and put it into 11 and/or 10.
How can you check the LWS engine version?

Wishlist - to be able to download an update of the LW engine. Fat chance.