RT+ 4x 580's

[jbeau3d]

I am new to Vray and Vray/RT. I'm trying to setup quad 580's but running into some issues particularly on performance and recognition within vray. I've ran though:
http://www.spot3d.com/vray/help/rt10...u.htm#hardware

I can see all the GPU's in the "select openCL devices" and set them. I've also tried as setting the environment variables as I didn't see any difference prior to installing the GPU's. I've used Octane in the past and imagine that this setup should resolve fairly quickly when I use vrayRT as my production renderer, but its still painfully slow using OpenCL(single) as the engine type.

I've tried running 262.99 and 263.09 Nvidia drivers. I'm on win7x64. When the GPU applet starts I don't see it printing out my openCL devices. I must be missing some step. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[vlado]

Which version of V-Ray RT are you using? Have you tried the 258.96 drivers? What does the V-Ray render server console window actually say?

Best regards,
Vlado

[jbeau3d]

2.00.02. The GTX 500 series drivers don't work with those drivers.

Here are the archived available options for drivers for the 500 series:

263.09
263.09
262.99

[jbeau3d]

Here is a screengrab on the RT cmdline running with a car + environment; poly count is just under 1 million.

[vlado]

Ah yes, true. What about the render server console (can't see the image)?

Best regards,
Vlado

[jbeau3d]

I think i see the issue. Network ports?

[vlado]

No the second error message just means that another copy of the render server is already running.

If you launch the OpenCL device query sample from the nVidia GPU computing SDK, does it list all the four GPUs?

Best regards,
Vlado

[jbeau3d]

here is a device query from the "select openCL devices for Vray"

[vlado]

Yep, thanks; what happens if you close 3ds Max and the V-Ray RT render server, enable just the first GeForce, and run V-Ray RT again?

Best regards,
Vlado

[jbeau3d]

Should I see the devices being loaded in the RT render server? I don't notice a difference when one GPU is enabled, still laggy and performance just isn't there...

I just noticed that the "select openCL devices for vray" showed this error when I set it to use a single GPU:
failed to update the openCL devices to use.

edit:I guess it shows this error everytime I set the devices regardless of configuration.

[vlado]

Yep, if you have UAC enabled then you might have to run it as an administrator (right-click > Run as Administrator). From what I can see, the RT render server is not using any GPUs at all; for what reason I'm not sure.

Can you tell me if any of the OpenCL samples from the nVidia GPU computing SDK run fine?

Best regards,
Vlado

[jbeau3d]

Yup. I think its currently using all CPU's. All my processors are pinging out as it resolves.

regarding SDK: Let me go track down the SDK. The next question is how do I run it to test the samples?

[vlado]

When you install the nVidia GPU Computing SDK, you will get an application called "nVidia computing SDK browser"; when you run it, you get three tabs of samples for CUDA, OpenCL and DirectCompute; go to the "OpenCL Samples" tab and try to run some of them (e.g. the "Marching Cubes Isosurfaces" one, or the "OpenCL device query" sample).

Best regards,
Vlado

[jbeau3d]

marching cubes worked. Also, device query showed all devices.

[vlado]

Very well then; a stupid question: did you tell V-Ray RT to use GPUs for rendering? If yes, can you try disabling the quadro with the V-Ray opencl device selector, deleting any *.clbin files from your temp folder, and running 3ds Max/V-Ray RT again?

Best regards,
Vlado