I’d like to get your advices to possibly change my GPU.
I currently have an AMD FX(m)-8350 Eight Core process, 10 Go DDRAM, ATI AMD Radeon9 200 series 3Go and as motherboard MSI 970 GAMING (MS-7693).
Images are slow to render with my configuration, I don’t have CUDA as my GPU is from ATI nor OpenCL as my card isn’t compatible.
For this reason I’d like to see if there are options available to make it quicker.
My motherboard supports from what I see PCI express 2, but from what I know I can still put a PCI express 3 GPU and that will be compatible, will it be less poweful though?
So you can use PCIe 3 cards in your machine, they’ll just run a bit slower than they could be. This is not likely to be a significant difference, especially for Cycles. For Cycles the difference will likely be limited to renders taking an extra second or two to start, if that. Gaming your might see a bit of a framerate loss compared to what you’d have otherwise, but even that is likely 10% or less.
Do not get another one of your current cards for Crossfire, that will not improve much of anything.
If you need help choosing a new card, we’ll need to know your budget and what country you will be buying in.
That site seems to have several 1050ti cards in your budget. Probably the best bet without spending more. You can check your current system with this benchmark: The new Cycles GPU 2.79 Benchmark
1050ti seems to complete the test in 4mins, or just under.
The 1060 6GB would be a big upgrade, but costs a lot more. But if saving up more is an option, it’s something to look into.
Especially with the upcomming releases of Nvidia cards, it might be valuable to wait few more weeks as the prices for current cards might be trimmed down to a point that getting the 1060 6GB will be more comfortable.
Note, avoid teh GTX 1060 3GB, it is to expensive for its performance.
Also any specific AMD/Nvidia preferences?
Also you have a strange config of 10Gb of DDR3 in your system. You are definitely loosing performance as unmatched dims do reduce FX cpu performance.
I can wait few weeks, in your opinion in how much time approximately It will be worthy to get a 1060 6GB for exemple ?
Preferences between AMD/Nividia ?
Not really, I have currently an AMD graphic card because this is a second hand computer I bought from a friend some years ago. He made that choice, I guess for costs reasons as AMD tend to be cheaper for equal quality (That’s what I was told). So if an AMD card is more suitable I’m not against, as far as I can have the equivalent of CUDA available within Blender with ‘good performance’, at least better than what I currently have…
For the DDR3 on my computer
Now you mention it, I’ll check again, that sounds indeed odd… When I’m back home, I’ll have a look at it, if needed I’ll adapt to fix that, thanks again.
Nvidia claims that the new cards (RTX 2070/2080/2080ti) will be out on September 20th. As such I expect price adjustements of cards around that time. Worst case is ofcourse they might decide not to adjust them. There is simply no way to be sure right now. Still it does give you one extra month to save a bit more
if you are purely into rendering/blender, then hey are on par. I have AMD cards only and performance wise, there is the thread below that comapres various cards using a new test… : The new Cycles GPU 2.79 Benchmark
Additionally blender had this set of benchmarks (CPU and GPU) across all its scenes (new site is being developed but still not much adata is there). Still with the link below you can click on any of the items in the legend to hide it. On average, in rendering an RX 580 vs the lower end GTX 1060 3Gb card. So the 1060 6GB would be closer to rx580. It just depends if you find a good deal on either the RX 580 8GB or GTX 1060 6GB.
I’ve seen that odd arrangement with a lot with factory-built HP boxes (14 instead of 16, 40 instead of 48). If I didn’t know any better, I would think they have a large stock of small RAM sticks they’re trying to get rid of.
About the RAM : It’s actually simple, after a quick check I could see there were three modules, 2 Corsair Vengeance Series of 4Go (DDR3, 1600 Mhz) and another one of 2 Go (Kingston) which had a lower frequency. I removed that one, because of that lower frequency . I don’t know If was right to do that.
See below, the frequency was 533Mhz, now It’s 666Mhz, but with 8Go only. At the same time you’ll have an overview of my specs.
I think I’ll maybe invest on another module to replace the kingston one I 've just removed.
Maybe the same module of RAM but in 8GO version like this one.
My PC has 4 slot, but 3 only can be used because of the heat sink ontop the CPU which is pretty big.
What do you think ?
You wrote Nvidia and AMD are on par. But is OPENCL as steady/good as CUDA ? I read somewhere (quite some months ago I admit) that OPENCL wasn’t steady at all…
Finally, here is the plan for the moment :
Wait until september and see if Nvidia prices are lower to get a Nvidia 1060 6GB, with the money left, get some more DDRAM 3.
HIghly recommend against using 3 memory sticks. Dual-channel memory is faster then single-channel memory. using 3 dims will cause single-channel operation and you’ll lose some performance.
Again, drop in performance is not major. but even up to 17% in some cases.
But again, the results depend and not major drops. And unsure how wlll blender respond especially in simulations.
As for the heatsink. ccan you post photos? (or link to the product). it could be possible to adjust the location of the fan to allow more space for more ram.
Not only that but for ddr3 according to jedec specs it should be 1333mhz(see below) for the basic modules(ddr = dual data rate, so the effective speed of 1333 means the individual chips are clocked at half that).
Memory frequency and latency can affect the cpu’s single core performance in data heavy operations.
edit:
Apparently I mis-recalled and ddr3 starts at 800. Probably for low-power/mobile parts.
Good point… but i think the tool is reporting the I/O clock speed, not final memory timings.
DIMM Type
Memory Clock
I/O Bus Clock
Peak Transfer Rate
DDR3-800
100 MHz
400 MHz
6400 MB/s
DDR3-1066
133 MHz
-> 533 MHz <-
8533 MB/s
DDR3-1333
166 MHz
666 MHz
10600 MB/s
DDR3-1600
200 MHz
800 MHz
12800 MB/s
DDR3-1866
233 MHz
933 MHz
14933 MB/s
DDR3-2133
266 MHz
1066 MHz
17066 MB/s
So in the end the system is running DDR3-1066 speeds, significantly cutting down performance. I’d recommend DDR3-1866. The motherboards supports up to DDR3-2133. This will defnitely give you a boost in some tasks, but again not every.
I rely on CPU-Z, which better reports clocks, and even has a dedicated Memory tab that identifies every indivdiual stick and their specific settings.
I’d recomend to first download CPU-Z, and check exactly what memory is in the system. I have a feeling that the 4GB sticks are faster, and the 2GB stick is a slower, slowing down the rest.
From what I could see quickly, I can’t rotate the heat sink and fan by 90° to access the forth memory slot. That’s why I had in mind to add a single 8 Go stick, It’ll be still quicker than what I currenty have, unless I can adapt the heat sink, but I don’t want to buy another one…
I had the idea to add some RAM as well if possible because I do some sculpting within Blender from time to time and I’m blocked when I have too many details because of a lack of memory, at least I guess… (I know I could use Z-brush or 3D Coat for such task, but that’s not the point here).
2) About Opencl:
Thank you so that looks steady, same with Eevee ? That’s working nicely ?
Here are the details of my computer with CPU-Z :
Thank you again for your help en enlightments, really!
Looking at the CPU cooler photo, depending how comfortable you are, it looks like you might be able to rotate it 90* to allow more room for full 4 stics of memory.
I’d have to better see how it is mounted to the motherboard to be sure.
Also, I think you are supposed to place the ram in an alternating fashion.
your ram slots from left to right: dimm 1 - 2 - 3 - 4.
1 is currently blocked by the cpu cooler (which is funny on its own), so instead try to go for 2 and 4.
Move the left ram one to the left.
with regards to the photo (unless you knwo the make of the cooler) I’d recommend to take of the fan at least which would give a clear view of the mounting mechanism.
Generally rotating 90* is quite possible, but there are rare cases that won’t allow it.
Again, this is only if you want to do such adjustment to allow you to get access to that last memory slot
!
