I upgraded my graphics card a while ago and have been plenty satisfied with it. However, I’d also like to put my older graphics card to good use. If possible, I’d like to SLI them both together, but I am not sure if that is possible (both cards support it, but are different models).
Does SLI require two of the exact same graphics card or will bridging these two cards work also? Lastly, when is blender going to get graphics card acceleration for rendering?
Edit: If I can’t run them in SLI, is there any harm caused by having them both in a system powering different displays?
SLI requires cards with the same chip. I.e two 7600gts etc. It is possible to mix manufactureres. I.e an evga 7600gt could be paired with an xfx 7600gt, though it’s best to go with two cards that are exactly the same. So just get another 7950 gt eh
Having two video cards installed simultaneously is possible - you’ll need to google how to set it up.
Eh, darn… I think I’ll still install it regardless. Maybe hook an extra monitor up to it.
I really wish blender internal could use the SLI technology (or even better, quad sli) to render. I’d go out and purchase more hardware, just to get the extra cycles and faster rendering times.
Yep, blender doesn’t use the gpu at all when rendering, though if you want to improve rendertimes and have the money to spend on hardware, then get a quad core cpu - you can pick one up for less than $300 us now (intel q6600). If you have money to burn, get two of them and pet them on a dual socket motherboard. That is, unless you’ve already got this setup
Nah, not yet :). The quad core, as far as I know, isn’t really true quad core yet. From what I understand, it’s the same sort of idea as the Pentium D where it’s two dual core processors taped together. Am I wrong or does Intel have the true quad cores out?
Right now, I’m running the Core 2 Duo e6400 (2.13GHz)
Edit: Of the major 3D modeling and rendering platform (I’m looking at 3Ds Max and Maya here), do either of them use the GPU for rendering? I remembered something about one of them using the GPU for something (which is why people spend the money on like the nVidia Quadro…), I just can’t remember what.
A far better way to improve rendering times drastically is to use distributed rendering (not network rendering as in animations). Simply use all the puters on your lan to help render one frame/still. Its great, cause when you upgrade your pc, you can keep the old one, connect it to your lan and it helps with the rendering. With bucket rendering, each cpu renders a bucket. I just don’t understand why more people don’t do this:confused:
As far as I know, Vray is the only proprietary renderer that can do it, though Yafray can do it too, with an added script.
Nah, they don’t have their ‘true’ quad cores out, but as far as I’m concerned, it’s a quad core, seeing as it does twice as much work as a dual core. I have a q6600 and I’m pretty happy with it so far. I mean, it’s basically two e6600s stuck together.
The e6600 costs 210 euro. the q6600 costs 235 euro. 25 euro extra for twice the power. Which one would you get? That’s a bit of a trick question though, as the new e6750, which is clocked at 2.66ghz, costs 170 euro.
If you’re buying a new processor with the intention of rendering in mind, the q6600 is the only real way to go, unless you have a very large budget. You could of course wait for the barcelonas from amd, which should be pretty good, but I don’t know what their pricing will be.
Did I mention that I can be a bit of a tech fetishist sometimes? :rolleyes:
Darn, the GPU is so powerful though! Maybe one day…
Yeah, I was reading up on ATI’s GPGPU technology which seems rather interesting also. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GPGPU if you’re curious. Too bad ATI’s rather flaky with blender.
That’s what I keep hearing, but I figured, if I have the cards, why not put them to use?
I’ve setup a renderfarm like this too, but quite frankly, I found it too hard to maintain and it took me longer to get the job setup than it did to render it. I used farmerjoe (which you can use any renderer you want with (I believe) since all that is required is the rendering software to be installed on every node. But then new versions of the software came out, and then I had to update all the machines which wasn’t fun, and I just wasn’t that pleased with it. Also, if I were to keep the farm up all the time, it consumes a lot of power…
Yeah, I considered it, but something about this equation makes me a little nervous. Only six or so months ago, the quad core chips were like 3 or 4 times the price. Now they are just under $300 USD? Also, why is the e6700 priced much higher than the e6750 which is still only $194?
It makes me wonder if Intel is getting geared up to pump out the “true” quad core chips? If so, I’ll wait and then upgrade later when they come down in price, stick two of them on a board and call it a day.
And, what’s everyone think about the new AMD quad cores?
if you read the review posted above, it says that when using only one processor, or even two, the intel wins. However, as you use 4 seperate processors at a time, the barcelona MIGHT be better. They are only 3 days old, so we can’t really know much about them really.
Tango, I’m not talking about network rendering, as in renderfarm for animations. Distributed rendering, when more than one pc renders one frame. I do it all the time, it just needed a once-off setup and runs smoothly. When I want to render, I just hit the render button and 5 cpu’s commence rendering
Right. FarmerJoe supports bucket rendering (where, lets say 4 computers work together. One machine produces the top left, one the top right, one the bottom left, and one the bottom right) and then the master puts them all together.
Am I misunderstanding what you are saying? And if you aren’t using your network… then what are you using?
And does anyone know what will happen if I connect the cards anyway? (I’m not about to try… just curious)
That’s a bit of a trick question though, as the new e6750, which is clocked at 2.66ghz, costs 170 euro.