GeForce 4 TI 4200 Viewport playback should be faster?

[Clanger]

In Max 4 it's:
Customize
Preference
Multi-threading - switch to on.

Don't know if it's the same in 5

I'll be very interested in price/where you've bought this system.
It's exactly the spec I intend to get.

[Velocamonkey]

Hi thanks I'll look into that. With Multithreading activated can you have something rendering on one processor whilst you use the other to model? And if so how does one acheive this?

I built my computer from salvaging CDwriter and monitor from an old computer and building the rest from scratch.

I got power suplly and fans from www.overclock.co.uk excellent service, came really fast.

Registered memory from www.Dabs.com also really fast, not bad value but I think you can get it cheaper now at www.crucial.co.uk.

Got everything else (graphics card, MP processors, motherboard tec) from www.ebuyer.co.uk

Ebuyer is really cheap and really efficient, I had a probelme in that they sent everything correct except 2 XP processors instaed of MP, there was then return difficulty and a load of crap lasting more than a mmonth until I fianlly got the 2 MPs I ordered in the first place. Other than that excellent.

It all cost a little under £1000 that ain't bad. I reckon if I searched more I could have got an even better deal.

Hope this is the info you wanted.

[Clanger]

Originally posted by Velocamonkey
Hi thanks I'll look into that. With Multithreading activated can you have something rendering on one processor whilst you use the other to model? And if so how does one acheive this?

I don't believe this is possible, reluctant to say you can't as often proved wrong but I've certainly not heard of anyone doing it.
You could try opening up max twice and see if you can carry on modelling at a useable speed.

Buying info: perfect. In the past I've always bought ready built but this time I really don't want another system case, monitor, keyboard etc. so I just might bite the bullet and go for it.

[Velocamonkey]

Wow thanks cool, I didn't think of that.
I opened two versions of Max 5 in Windows 2000 Pro and setup one to render a complex lighting scene whilst I polymodelled in the other, it worked excellently!!

I was modelling at normal speed with no slow down or noticable difference and once I finished my model and checked back on the other opened max the rendering had finished. This is an awesome time saver, I can be working whilst I'm rendering. Sweet!

[gaggle]

The rendering is the biggest bonus when it comes to multithreading. You could do the modeling thing on a second instance of MAX even if you're using one CPU, this I tried once.

I don't think you should do the two-instance MAX thing though, it's a.. well.. it's not a good solution at all. Set up the network server and manager and render via the netrender. It'll pop up the rendering in the background, and you can just continue to work. It works very well.

As for your viewport thing, I suggest switching to OGL mode. It's better. In my experience MAX simply favors using OGL.. more optimized for it I guess, idunno. DX8 mode would, imo, be for people who either a) can't run in OGL mode for some reason, or b) game developers.


Hope that helps.

[Chris Thomas]

The current situation in Max 5 is...

Direct 3d is very fast in shaded view, but poor with wireframe

OpenGL is fast in wireframe but quite slow in shaded

so choose the mode that suits you best...

mind you I wish max had the OpenGL performance of XSI or Maya
They both make max's 3D display seem very sluggish by comparison :(

Chris Thomas

[Velocamonkey]

Thanks for the replies.

Gaggle:"I don't think you should do the two-instance MAX thing though, it's a.. well.. it's not a good solution at all."

Why not, will my way damage my systme or anything? Is the way you suggested faster?

[visualboo]

Ya, this is my biggest complaint with Max. Viewport speed.

I'm just hopeing it will get fixed in an update.

[KiboOst]

I don't think you should do the two-instance MAX thing though, it's a.. well.. it's not a good solution at all. Set up the network server and manager and render via the netrender. It'll pop up the rendering in the background, and you can just continue to work. It works very well.

I use always two session, and works really nice. It happens to me to use thress session, one rendering, another working, with a third to see object etc to merge in the second. And launching max with netrender open a second session too...
Of course I've only dual-proc system.

You can too attribute one max session (or toshop or what you want) on one proc, and another one to the second proc.

Kib

[Velocamonkey]

KiboOst yeah, I don't see the problem in using two instances of Max.

By the way you said:

"You can too attribute one max session (or toshop or what you want) on one proc, and another one to the second proc."

How exactly do I go about assigning 1 processor to one max session and 1 processor to the other?

Thanks, I'm new to dual processors!

[gaggle]

Originally posted by Velocamonkey
Thanks for the replies.

Gaggle:"I don't think you should do the two-instance MAX thing though, it's a.. well.. it's not a good solution at all."

Why not, will my way damage my systme or anything? Is the way you suggested faster?


Op, naw, sorry if it sounded like that. No you can do it just fine. Tthere are some settings-things that can potentially get a little confusing, if you change something in the one MAX, and the other MAX overwrites it and such. And some potential OGL or DX8 issues that can pop up with a lot of ALT-TABing between thw two isntances, with a program as demanding as MAX. That depends a lot on the system though, some systems for some reason seems to easily give up on two OGL programs active, so one of them falls back to software-emulated OGL. Which is.. slow. Very... very... slow :)

But no, I meant what I said as in I don't think there's much of a reason to to have a MAX open for rendering and one for modeling, as you can fire off jobs to the net-manager and have it all happen in the background without any problems. It's a much more clean solution to the whole thing.

Now if you want to have a MAX open for working, and one for checking the scenes that you're going to be merging from, as KiboOst does, then that's all good. Provided you're not bugged from various technical issues of course, but you'll soon see if that's the case :) Oh, btw, in the case you experience display problems with two running MAXs, you could try and start the 2nd instance of MAX using the Heidi software-rendere. Anyways, there's no real alternative to using a 2nd MAX if you want to check out things from another scene. My earlier response was very specifically towards using a 2nd MAX for rendering :)

If you do the two-MAX thing, I can only recommend two monitors, and having one MAX on each, it's quite the neat workflow :)

[scribble]

I don't have a Dual CPU setup, but someone i know of does, he told me it was possible for win2000 to allocate different applications you have running a certain amount of your processing power. If no-one else replies, I'll try and get in contact with him if you dont work it out.

[gaggle]

Oh right, the processor thing. Open Tast Manager (SHIFT-CTRL-ESC), go to the "Processes" tab, rightclick on the 3dsmax.exe process, and choose "Set Affinity". There you can assign CPUs that the process has access to.

I've played much Aliens vs. Predator and Battlefield whilest having MAX rendering on the 2nd CPU. It works nicely. There can be issues if, say, the first job completes its rendering, and a new job starts, as Windows has a tendency to shift its focus to the newly-opened MAX, thus minimizing the game.
Also if that happens the 3dsmax.exe process is newly spawned, and as such, if memory serves, needs to have its affinity changed all over again.

I heard of a tool for Windows 2000 and XP Server that can do a more permanent affinity-setting, but idunno any details.. I think you just have to live with setting these things manually.. unless someone takes mercy and programs a little utility for us.

[Velocamonkey]

Cheers dude, I think I get it now. I haven't tried out what you said yet, but you mentioned:

"as you can fire off jobs to the net-manager and have it all happen in the background without any problems."

How do I use the net manager? I thought this was something to do with Network Rendering, and that's when you've got different ccomputers hooked up together isn't it? Like I said I'm new to this so thanks for the help so far!

[gaggle]

Yeah you got it right, network rendering is for harnesing the power of many machines for rendering. But the trick here is that there's no reason why a single machine can't netrender. It does require a network card, if you don't have that you'll run into into problems.

The thing is, you fire up the Network Manager on your machine, then the Network Server, and it connects to itself just fine. For details on how to set up and use the Network Manager, Network Server, and QueueManager, check your manual. It also has all the stuff you'll want to know on how to have MAX connect to the Manager and assign it jobs.

And if there are any questions on this.. just ask :), we're all here to help and learn :thumbsup:

[Velocamonkey]

Cool thanks, I'll test all this stuff out and get back to you when I fail miserably! :):)

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