I know you don't want to embrace it, but there really is a significant problem with Max and IPR Renders

[RobH22]

I know you don't want to embrace it, but there really is a significant problem with Max and IPR Renders. I've been writing here about it for over a year. And I have a good reason below that points to the fact that it is a Max issue, not a confilct or user issue.

The Chaos Group team is a fantastic group and please don't think I'm disparaging you. But your responses are that, "no, we don't have a problem here and can't reproduce it." There is a lot of chatter about it at AreaMAX and a bunch of us thought it might be a conflict with AMD Ryzen processors. Most of us with it have those.

The problem is debilitating lag. It wasn't this way just a couple years ago. It was smooth as glass and if you rotated in the viewport, the IPR would obviously switch to giant pixels and then start to refine, but it was buttery smooth. Now it's just a laggy, disheatening mess.

I don't think it's AMD processors now. I think it's a bug between V-Ray and Max. Reason being, I've been using Rhino 7 for a few weeks now intensely. I'm using the same machine that has Max on it. The IPR in Rhino is that same buttery smooth experience we used to have in Max. It's a beautiful thing when it works well. We don't have V-Ray Vision in Max yet (I say that as if I I knew it was comming but have no idea...but please do) but it is super smooth as well.

It's time to stand up and acknowledge that there really is somehting going on between V-Ray 6 and Max 2022 thru 2024 for sure. Too many of us who are not noobs have it and have been struggling to resolve it. Please Chaos gurus, you are some of the best programmers on the planet, I know that you can fix this, but, you have to be willing to acknowledge it exists. Trust me, it does.

How can we help you get to the bottom of it?

[vladimir_krastev]

HI, thanks for posting. Could you send us a link to the discussions you mentioned? What versions of V-Ray and 3ds Max are you testing? Are those from your signature?
Can you record a video of the issues you are describing? If you have a test scene that you can send we would be happy to review it. Send it over here or through the support contact form.

[RobH22]

Hi Vladimir, I just searched for about 30-minutes and had trouble finding them. I'll look again. Part of the problem is that the search algorithm is not great there and the comments are buried in another post about a different issue. There are at least two threads where we go off topic a bit and talk about the IPR issue. I thought I had them bookmarked but unfortunately I hadn't. I started noticing something going on around Max 2022 when I built a new machine with a Ryzen processor, the first time I had a non-Intel machine. I've built probably 50 3d machines, so I'm pretty good at it and in making sure they run at top speed. It's an issue with every Max version since I noticed it with 2022 and V-Ray 6.

So, I'll do two things, 1) I'll search again and try to find them and 2) I'll post a new thread to query users to see how many people are having the issue.

Lastly, I'm happy to do some screen recordings to show you what's going on. Thanks for responding to this. Having used V-Ray and Max for over 25-years I have a good feel for how they perform, as you guys do. And something is a bit off these days. I'll get back to you. Thanks.

[RobH22]

I have a thread out at Autodesk collecting feedback from others. Meanwhile, here are a few from this forum:
https://forums.chaos.com/forum/v-ray...ipr-is-running
https://forums.chaos.com/forum/v-ray...er-in-the-past
https://forums.chaos.com/forum/v-ray...ng-in-viewport

[menno_vandijk]

RobH22 does adjusting the undersampling settings help with the performance?

[RobH22]

When you say 'undersampling', what specific parameter name are you referring to?

[RobH22]

Here is a video that shows the issue. It seems to be tied to Slate being open. And therein lies the problem. The reason to use IPR most of the time is to view the model while adjusting materials. So to have the scene crippled by the thing that IPR is needed for is not good. Without Slate open I can average around 20-25fps. With it open, maybe 5 or 6fps, often worse.

I used a fairly heavy file to show this. But, it happens with a light scenes. It's not quite as severe, but I get the same results with smaller scenes. Something in Slate is causing a bottleneck. I also have all of my libraries set to "not" show icons. They are only text. That helps Slate overall and has been a needed workflow for a few years. Having material icons on cripples Slate no matter what.

Aside from the Slate material icon tweak, this IPR performance issue wasn't a problem in the past. This is something new and something very disruptive to production workflow and schedules. IPR works perfectly in Rhino and Sketchup. So it's not my system specs. I hope we can work together and find out what's causing this in Max. I'm happy to do any testing you'd like to see.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1PIa...usp=drive_link

[vladimir_krastev]

Hi, thanks for the video. I tried to reproduce what you are showing in a test scene consisting of a few models and vegetation from Cosmos but on my end IPR works fine. Could you archive and send your test scene for review? You could do that here or through our support contact form.

[caypiranha]

Try to renew your user settings in Max. This sometimes helps this problems too. If so, it´s again a sad thing, that Autodesk has to be aware of. For my taste, usersettings has to be restored too much often, if you are having a more advanced customized UI. Any script or plugin ma be the troublemaker as well.

[RobH22]

Vladimir, I will do that at some point. I'm crunching out a project currently so can't get it it for a week or so.

Thanks Caypiranha, yea, that's a workflow I'm very adept at over the decades. In this case, no help. You do bring up a good point, I think I'll save my ENU and start a fresh one and test to see how things run with no added scripts or plugins. My customization is pretty tame though to be honest. That's one thing I should have thought of and haven't tried. What I am taking more advantage of is 'V-Ray GPU 6' rendering with CUDA enabled. It helps a little, but I miss the smooth fluidity that I used to enjoy with the standard renderer and IPR. That was a glorious time...lol...

Vladimir, I'll make up a file as soon as I can get to it.

[glorybound]

For my taste, usersettings has to be restored too much often.

Every time I have an issue AD's solution is to delete the ENU file; it is maddening!

[Pixelcon]

I recommend taking a copy of your settings each time you alter your interface. Easy.

[^Lele^]

Here is a video that shows the issue. It seems to be tied to Slate being open. And therein lies the problem. The reason to use IPR most of the time is to view the model while adjusting materials. So to have the scene crippled by the thing that IPR is needed for is not good. Without Slate open I can average around 20-25fps. With it open, maybe 5 or 6fps, often worse.

I used a fairly heavy file to show this. But, it happens with a light scenes. It's not quite as severe, but I get the same results with smaller scenes. Something in Slate is causing a bottleneck. I also have all of my libraries set to "not" show icons. They are only text. That helps Slate overall and has been a needed workflow for a few years. Having material icons on cripples Slate no matter what.

Aside from the Slate material icon tweak, this IPR performance issue wasn't a problem in the past. This is something new and something very disruptive to production workflow and schedules. IPR works perfectly in Rhino and Sketchup. So it's not my system specs. I hope we can work together and find out what's causing this in Max. I'm happy to do any testing you'd like to see.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1PIa...usp=drive_link

If that water was displaced, and displacement was view-dependent (i.e. by default, with the edge lenght in pixels), then changing the IPR view would force recalculation.
Is that the case?

[RobH22]

I just picked a scene that was kind of heavy. The same anamoly occurs with scenes that just have solid geometry with no displacement on anything at all. I've been super swamped, but I'll upload another example and video as soon as I come up for air. I've been using V-Ray every day for a long time. This issue is not a scene file or material issue. It's a global change that's occureed over the past few releases of V-Ray in 3ds Max.

[^Lele^]

If a scene can reproduce the issue, then it's easier to find a fix.
Consider support could also set up with you a remote session to test things out.