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Adding GPU cards to network nodes.

Posted: Fri Nov 30, 2012 4:44 pm
by debido666
I understand only one card is supported (for now).
Will adding a GPU card to a node work/help? Or just keep the slave CPU only?

Node specs:

CPU: 2 x AMD Opteron 4180 6-Core @ 2.6GHz (12-Cores)
Memory: 8GB (DDR3 1333)
Motherboard: PCI Express 2.0 (ASUS KCMA-D8)

I'm using two nodes (24-Cores)

Re: Adding GPU cards to network nodes.

Posted: Fri Nov 30, 2012 6:08 pm
by ENSLAVER
I believe at the moment you get more benefit per $ from adding extra CPU cores, also more versatility.

Re: Adding GPU cards to network nodes.

Posted: Fri Nov 30, 2012 8:07 pm
by Zom-B
Oh my gosh, that are two sexy nodes you have there!
I don't know how the situation is for a dual CPU setup for Hybrid (GPU) rendering, and I also don't know if there is somebody with experience in that!

Problem in Hybrid rendering is the bottleneck in CPU <> GPU communication. How that behave having two CPUs and "only" PCI Express 2 is the question here.

My suggestion would be to stay with pure CPU power since since together with some Master renderer you should have enough raw power to master each scene in PT+BiDir with full caustic render support :)

Re: Adding GPU cards to network nodes.

Posted: Sat Dec 01, 2012 8:24 am
by debido666
Zom-B wrote:Oh my gosh, that are two sexy nodes you have there!
I don't know how the situation is for a dual CPU setup for Hybrid (GPU) rendering, and I also don't know if there is somebody with experience in that!

Problem in Hybrid rendering is the bottleneck in CPU <> GPU communication. How that behave having two CPUs and "only" PCI Express 2 is the question here.

My suggestion would be to stay with pure CPU power since since together with some Master renderer you should have enough raw power to master each scene in PT+BiDir with full caustic render support :)
I'll stay with CPUs, for now. Any problems upgrading 2.x to 3.x?

Re: Adding GPU cards to network nodes.

Posted: Sat Dec 01, 2012 8:43 am
by pixie
debido666 wrote:
Zom-B wrote:Oh my gosh, that are two sexy nodes you have there!
I don't know how the situation is for a dual CPU setup for Hybrid (GPU) rendering, and I also don't know if there is somebody with experience in that!

Problem in Hybrid rendering is the bottleneck in CPU <> GPU communication. How that behave having two CPUs and "only" PCI Express 2 is the question here.

My suggestion would be to stay with pure CPU power since since together with some Master renderer you should have enough raw power to master each scene in PT+BiDir with full caustic render support :)
I'll stay with CPUs, for now. Any problems upgrading 2.x to 3.x?
It may start rendering faster then expected...

Re: Adding GPU cards to network nodes.

Posted: Sat Dec 01, 2012 11:08 am
by debido666
pixie wrote:
debido666 wrote:
Zom-B wrote:Oh my gosh, that are two sexy nodes you have there!
I don't know how the situation is for a dual CPU setup for Hybrid (GPU) rendering, and I also don't know if there is somebody with experience in that!

Problem in Hybrid rendering is the bottleneck in CPU <> GPU communication. How that behave having two CPUs and "only" PCI Express 2 is the question here.

My suggestion would be to stay with pure CPU power since since together with some Master renderer you should have enough raw power to master each scene in PT+BiDir with full caustic render support :)
I'll stay with CPUs, for now. Any problems upgrading 2.x to 3.x?
It may start rendering faster then expected...
Sorry, I meant during installation. Windows.

Re: Adding GPU cards to network nodes.

Posted: Sat Dec 01, 2012 9:28 pm
by Zom-B
no at all :)
Only the situation with 3D Max Exporter is maybe a little "complicated" atm, but anything else should have developed nicly!