8 CPU Systems Question..

[RaGzMaN]

simple answer, no, well, they may run but they might just utilise half the proc if your lucky

[Crayox]

Why not? - a message was too short so I added this :-)

[mike0006]

Ya, why not? Boxx has a new four processor computer out. It's called the Apexx 4 I think. It runs just fine up to full capacity. (It's a Boxx, what do you expect?) They should be coming out with an eight processor computer pretty soon. So I don't see why there would be any problems with running an eight processor motherboard.

Though depending on what you are going to use for rendering it could get very expensive very quick. If you went with eight dual-core processors, (I don't see why you wouldn't) that would be 16 mental-ray licenses.

Can you say "Bling Bling"

[ipaddress]

As long as the Procs are X86 compatible they would run the applications. Only difference would be many of the appications dont recognise or is not programmed to utilize multiple processors. Maya and 3dsMAX can use as many processors as it detects. Not sure about the other apps. Maya as I have seen uses all the available procs only in rendering time. ( please correct me if I am wrong). Those 8 proc boards ( I guess they are also called as "blades" are designed to run in a chassis designed to fit them and is used for building render clusters.)

[RaGzMaN]

For starters im not even sure that the board and expansion board that is required for 16 cores is even publicly avaliable.

Secondly, i have effectivly 4 CPUs and not that many things completely utilise all 4 cores 100%
I konw for a fact Mental ray and maya will not use 16 cores, or even 8 for that matter. Mental ray ships with 4 liciences, if you want more you got to buy it again.

If you had the hardware and software, im not saying it wont work, it will, you just wont make use of all that processing power with something like Mental Ray for maya for example, your limited to 4

[Crayox]

Yeah well, I don't like nor use MR, only vray, and with vray, you can use AFAIK as many cores as you want. So I see a GREAT usage of those 16 cores.....A REAL DREEEWL

[RaGzMaN]

man i wish you could do that with mr, still the cost is purley insane for 16 cores.

[lots]

The motherboard in use on the Boxx system is the Tyan K8QW. This board paired with its daughter board, supports 128GB of RAM and 8 dual core Opterons.

http://www.tyan.com/products/html/thunderk8qw.html

It also features PCIe for the latest and greatest in graphics tech, along with a second 4x powered 16x PCIe slot. Supposidly its capable of SLI :).

Now for the down side :P

In order to use this board even without the expansion board, you will need Windows Server 2003 or some flavor of linux. Your software (mainly your render licenses) need to allow you either unlimited nodes, or the ability to use 16 threads. On top of that, the system its self costs at least $20,000 (for the 4 way setup) and over $50,000 (for the 8 way setup). So unless you're rich or working for a big company, this computer is NOT for you. In fact, it would be cheaper to buy 80 Opteron 165 based render nodes :P That would give you 160 cores :) That would DEFINATELY give you a much larger processing power than that meager 8 way dual core setup :P

Granted I dont want to think of the power bill for either, but if you've got 50,000 to spend on computers, you can pay it.

Of cource a more modest render farm of 16 Opteron 165 systems will get you about $10k. Thats still more thread parallelism than a single 8 way setup.

[SweetDreamz]

If I have that much to spend, I think I'll get myself a fairly decent car instead or pay towards a house, new house in fact.

[lots]

My point, SweetDreamz ;)

[MadMax]

I love all these "I'm looking at getting an 8 core Opteron system" threads. yeah, well I'm off to buy the Playboy mansion.............

[alejandro_m1]

If I have that much to spend, I think I'll get myself a fairly decent car instead or pay towards a house, new house in fact.

:eek: At least the house wouldn´t become obsolete in quite a few years

[csmallfield]

and the car wouldn't crash as much as the 8 procs

[Cerenkovman]

So if I'm reading all this correctly, even though you can specify in Maya how many processors you will be using you're still limited by how many the license covers? That's just insane given that I've fooled with the slider and you can put some crazy numbers in there! That's a real bummer for those lucky few that can muster a nice multi processor machine.

[lots]

I think a dual dual core system is plenty for home use (doing 3D and rendering stills an animaitons). If you need more than that, you likely will be working for a studio of some kind, where they've got dozens of render nodes awaiting your every command :P

I think everyone should forget this 8 way business for thier personal use. Don't get me wrong, the machines are awsome, and pack a punch, but I dont see anyone needing that much pwoer at home for quite some time. Especially considering the license issues.

[ihavenofish]

16 cores is not cost effect for general use.

3ds max for example uses 1 cpu for much of its processes. for rendering, mental ray is limited to 4 cores due to licensing. default scanline could use all 16.

BUT... this machine wont scale linearly. cost asside, if you render animations, 8 dual core, single cpu machines will by far out perform a 16 core monster. and costs in... its probably less than 1/2 the price for the setup. in order to make use of a machine like this (anything with more than 4 cores really), you need something that absolutely needs to be done within a single machine, AND scales exceptionaly well. in the cg realm... there really isnt anything that meets this criteria. even large single frames are more efficiently distributed over many pc's.

[Cerenkovman]

So if the "little" guy wanted to make a short what kind of money is he looking at to get this thing rendered? I've been checking out render farms and they seem to be all over the map. What gives?

[ihavenofish]

im not sure what "little guy" has to do with a 16 core machine. im pretty sure no "little guy" can afford to buy it :)

[Cerenkovman]

I guess what I mean is I would like to get something rendered this year. With the frame rates I've been getting it wouldn't happen. A 16 core machine has a lot to do with what I asked, and you're right I can't afford it. So I ask again, what is the option? Render farm? That too, from what I've seen, is also very expensive. Thanks in advance.

[JDex]

A renderfarm of 4 budget nodes can be very cost-effective. For less than $10,000 you can outfit yourself with a very powerful, modern farm for personal use. Conversely for $1000 you could get a bunch of older, used systems that can help. Renderer licensing for some apps is the killer, but if you're using an engine with unlimited licenses a shoestring budget can save you a great deal of time if you get creative.

That said... it's probably a good idea to get very good at scene optimization and effectively using compositing... these techniques can reduce rendertimes significantly.

If you are very good at these techniques... well then perhaps the animations are too complex for your means. Nothing wrong with that. It's not in the cards of most to have animations that can reflect all the latest techniques and beauty elements that make good shots great.

[ihavenofish]

ahh, ok...
well, the 3 general options are:

buy as much render farm as you can. a single x2 3800 system can come in under $1000us. so, the cheapest option woul dbe to keep buying as many of these as youre cashflow allows. 10 machines for $10000 would be a great start if they could be justified.

second option is to pay someone else to render.. like respower for example. unfortunately, depending on what you need done, they arent all that cheap either and can quickly hit $10k.

if neither of these are within budget... well, then you are left with 1 last option... the most common one. optimise youre scenes and take a hit on quality. noone likes this option, but everyone uses it... even the big shops.

later

[Cerenkovman]

Right on! Thanks for the answers guys. I really appreciate it and hope to be able to return the favor some day.

[[nitin design]]

I don't know about 8 CPUs but if AMD really cut the prices of the Opterons..say $4xx for an Opteron 270/275 then buying 4 dual core CPUs is not that unimaginable.
I don't know about the price of the Tyan K8QW MOBO but it's doable in the near future if you really got the need and the $$$.

I personally would be very satisfied with just 2 Opteron 280s OR 285s :)

[alejandro_m1]

Go for the render farm, I´m in the process of building mine and have found some sweet deals for them, a node with X2 4200+, an MSI mobo with video and audio included and gigabit ethernet, 2 gigs of ram and a small hdd (40 gigs) could cost around $600 each, you don´t need cds for each of them, just a sinlge usb dvd-rw, kvm for swaping between nodes, also no worries about audio, video, and all that stuff that ads to the final cost... For the price of an opteron 4xx (dual core) you could buy several render nodes which would beat the opteron in render times. Mine is around $6000 for 10 nodes.

']I don't know about 8 CPUs but if AMD really cut the prices of the Opterons..say $4xx for an Opteron 270/275 then buying 4 dual core CPUs is not that unimaginable.
I don't know about the price of the Tyan K8QW MOBO but it's doable in the near future if you really got the need and the $$$.

I personally would be very satisfied with just 2 Opteron 280s OR 285s :)

I hope you are right about the price of the 275 but I´m looking at it right now in newegg and it is $1k, look:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16819103551

Also if you built a 4 dual core processors you would need the 8xx opteron, for the 875 which is $2k at monarch computer. Sum up 4 of this and you have $8k just for the processors, and $2k more for the K8QW mobo. With a decent video, hdd and case expect it over the $10,000 (and remember it would only be 8 cores). For that amount I could buy around 16 X2 render nodes (32 cores!)

[[nitin design]]

Don't worry I am only going for the 2x 280system after 15th of Feb. and not interested in the 4 socket Motherboards. I was just thinking out loud.

Btw the Opt 270 price I was talking about was based on the rumoured price drop that is coming around 15th of Feb and not the current CPU prices.

http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=29195 (http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=29195)

[mustique]

8-cores won't model, texture paint or animate faster. Only rendering will benefit. Also
as soon as I think about maya's dynamics engine and/or other things in other apps that are not multithreaded, a machine with 2 powerfull dual-core procs is a much better choice IMO.
You can buy several of them if you need serious rendering power.

[mike0006]

I love all these "I'm looking at getting an 8 core Opteron system" threads. yeah, well I'm off to buy the Playboy mansion.............

There's no way you're gonna beat me to it!!!

[lots]

You can build an X2 3800 system for closer to $600 from what I've looked at. So with $2400, thats easily 8 cores...

[ihavenofish]

$600? how ya manage that? $300 for cpu... $180 for 2gb ram... $90 for mobo w/built in video.... $150 for windows.... case, hd..

but either way, they are pretty cheap :)

[lots]

1 GB of ram, gets around $581, 2GB of RAM gets to about $640. :) Of cource this assumes you can use a linux based network renderer...

Otherwise you'll have to add another $100 to $130 to get Windows...

Still well below $1000 anyway *shrug*

[alejandro_m1]

Damn, I forgot windows in the price, ok so it goes something like this:

Motherboard MSI K8NGM2-L $66
AMD 64 X2 4200+ $400
1gb Mushkin ddr 400 (x2) $140
Maxtor DiamondMax 8s $42
Generic aluminium case w/360w PSU $30

For a grand total of: $678 :thumbsup:

But since I forgot windows it would be $140 more per win2k license (hope I could go for linux but I will render in max!)... guess I´ll have to go for the 3800+ ($300) to return to budget or just 1gb ram, which one would you think is best lots?

[ihavenofish]

id go more ram over tha faster cpu... but my work tends to be ram intensive.. it depends what you do really.

[daskog]

I think someone should invent a render PCI card with 4 dualcores or more then the problems would be solved! forget this silly Socket think for GFX lol.
Maby i need to talk to some Russian nuclear scientist's maby they could help.

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