Increase Render Time Help

[Steven547]

OK...sorry if this has been brought up...(i'm sure it has, I just couldn't find it in the search), but what does everyone turn off on the computer to increase render time? (Virus programs, etc). There was a post talking about what to turn off, but I can't find it.

 

Thanks.

[ddustin]

OK...sorry if this has been brought up...(i'm sure it has, I just couldn't find it in the search), but what does everyone turn off on the computer to increase render time? (Virus programs, etc). There was a post talking about what to turn off, but I can't find it.

 

Thanks.

 

Steven,

 

I think you mean decrease render time/ increase render performance.

 

As long as you turn of things that are using the CPU you will see some gain, otherwise there won't be that much.

 

If you are using an AMD processor there are tweaks you can do to speed up the clock (can be risky).

 

Basically, the faster the CPU speed the faster the render.

 

Don't surf the web or do anything else on the computer rendering as it will take CPU horsepower away.

You can turn off things like AV but then you need to remember to turn it back on.

 

Hope this helps.

David

[Steven547]

Thanks for the quick response!

[Ganthofer]

Here are some Forum links that may be of interest

OMG! Lightning fast renders!, Zippidy do da!

AM and Multiple Core CPUs, Want to get the rendering to be as fast is it can be on this system.

P4 Hyperthreading, some lessons learned

 

One thing that I have found to decrease render time (Increase speed) is specific only to Intel CPU's with Hyper threading with Dual channel memory, Oh yeh and XP Pro (I haven't tested it with anything else!).

 

Meeting all of the above requirements( I have a P4 HT 2.8 ghz with 2gb of dual channel DDR2 memory - Oh and a motherboard that supports Dual Channel memory!), and if you are rendering more than one image (a series of TGA's for example.....), You can open 2 instances of A:M and render both at the same time (I ussually render odd even frames, but first half - last half would work also). I use 2 copies of the project and associated files to reduce the chance of file access problems/contention. you must have enough physical memory to prevent Page file(swap) use.

 

I don't have any added software on this PC so setting the Priority (from Normal to Realtime) of Master.exe in the Taskmanagers Processes list doesn't gain me anything.

 

The render time for an individual image (in either instance of A:M) is slightly longer than if you only had one instance of A:M running, but the fact that you are getting 2 frames (2 instances A:M running) in slightly more time than 1 frame (1 instance A:M running). I have seen as much as a 40% time saving. I have also seen frames that have nearly no time saving what so ever, these have been very few in my case though.

 

There are other hardware and software considerations that could probably be optimised (haven't tried these yet to see):

-multiple hard drives - each instance writing to it's own physical drive.

-video card that doesn't use shared memory

-disabling the realtime virus scanning of the A:M files.

-removing from startup or disable any applications/services not needed. (this list could be huge and will vary greatly depending on your machine)

[thumperness]

Should we also get into reducing the patch count?

[luckbat]

Patch count has no significant impact on render times.

[KenH]

I remember several thread about this. Do a search for render speed or something like that.

 

One thing is to increase the priority of your AM on your cpu using the task manager.

[ddustin]

Patch count has no significant impact on render times.

 

Woah......

 

So the more objects you have in the chor, the higher the patch count, the more things that need to be rendered, sure seems to increase render times.

 

Why else are there suggestions to turn things off when not in the view?

 

David

[luckbat]

Things that are outside the camera range can still cast shadows and reflections, so the renderer has to include them in the calculations. If you know for sure that these items have no visual impact, you can feel free to turn them off.

[ddustin]

Thanks to all for the Hyperthreading tips.

I have one Dell render slave, and Hyperthreading was enabled.

 

The BIOS let me disable it, so now we are using 100% of the processor while rendering.

 

I'm running a test now with it and my fastest AMD64 head to head. Lots of reflections and transparencies.

 

3.4 Ghz Pentium 4 vs AMD Athlon 64 3400 (2.4 Ghz).

 

So far the AMD is rendering about 3:25 minutes per frame, and the Pentium is 4:25 minutes per frame.

 

AMD wins this round.

 

(yes I know this is common knowledge, just wanted to test for myself).

 

EDIT: After re-enabling Hyperthreading, there was no difference in the render times before and after.

AMD still wins.

I do remember reading where winXP needs to be reinstalled to take advantage of HT being disabled, but the rendering process was taking 100% of the processor power when HT was disabled.

[Ganthofer]

The 100% vs. 50% in the Task manager Performance Tab is a bit misleading.

 

If Hyper threading is enabled and you run one instance of A:M you will see around 50% (that's 100% of one virtual CPU). Split the graph (View>CPU History>One graph Per CPU) and you should see that one (virtual) CPU is pegged to the top and the other is not doing much of anything. The little bit that shows on the second (virtual) CPU are processes taking advantage of the Hyper Threading.

 

So when Hyper Threading is enable and one graph is pegged at the top, 50% really is the same as 100% with Hyper Threading disabled.

 

When the second (virtual) CPU graph starts trending up is where you can see performance gains (or losses!!) depending on the application and contention for the same resources.