I have some informations about newest AMD 1950X, that it cant allocate whole RAM while rendering. Probably because this procesor contain two procesors in one package, it allocate only half memory for one internal procesor. So if I have let says 64GB of RAM, when system use half of it, only 32GB, then start to swap. Is this a true please?
Never heard of this. Where did you get this information from, can you please post link or show evidence? Do you think they would release a processor that can’t allocate your RAM properly? Sounds like a rumor to me or you misunderstood. The two dies in Threadripper, just like in Epyc (which has 4 dies), are interconnected and can freely talk to each other and allocate all the RAM they need thanks to Infinity Fabric and the MCM (multi chip module) design.
Check out these videos and you’ll get a better idea of how Threadripper and Epyc work:
My friend watched rendering on a new computer AMD 1950X with 64GB of RAM and after 32GB was full computer slow down and swap to HDD.
I just wanna ask somebody with this AMD if anybody notice this problem.
Its something like dual xeons which has already been discussed here many times. But for me I think there was some problem with AMD computer because its look weird to me. I just wanna know other opinion, thank you.
I’ve just tested this by deliberately making the scene heavy (no instanced objects, lots of unnecessary displacements etc.). Well… no such problem here. For me it allocates as much RAM as it needs. Please see the screenshots below. You can see that Max is able to allocate quite a lot more than 32 GB RAM and there’s no disk swap activity. My render or PC didn’t slow down after surpassing 32GB either.
Maybe there are some settings in Windows and/or BIOS that you’ve changed to cause this behavior? Maybe you can also check if your RAM was installed properly in the motherboard? Also, does it run in quad channel mode? It should for optimal performance. Can you post some screenshots/videos of this behavior? That would be interesting to see.
Hi,
I did another test on my work PC, tried to fill the RAM with vraydisplacement. Now it can allocate whole 64GB RAM (4*16 GB quad channel). But in some rare cases (i need to find in which one ), i can’t get over 32GB of RAM.
MB : Gigabyte X399 Aorus Gaming 7(latest bios version).
That’s interesting. In the first image (the birds eye view) I haven’t used any displacements and it still uses as much RAM as it needs. If you find a case where it can’t use more than 32 GB and starts swapping to disk, just send me the scene (if possible, of course) and I’ll test it on my system too.
Interesting, so there is some problem with this CPU. The questin is what couses this problem. Vsha, if you can share problematic scene with Alex to test it, it would be helpful.
Can’t share scenes, because NDA. But I am testing different heavy scenes which i modified to allocate whole RAM (volumetrics, ornatrix, forest pack, turbosmooth x8 :)), All are working fine.
I changed some settings in BIOS and windows a few days ago. Maybe I found the solution and didn’t know about it until now - i didn’t need more than 32GB RAM.
Result of testing : there was a problem with RAM allocation in a new untouched workstation, but it can be fixed with some updates and magic.
Well, there are 2 machines here with Threadripper 1950X and 64 GB RAM that we bought so I can test this. In the few tests I did, I haven’t seen such problems. As you can see by the screenshots I posted above, 1950X is able to use a lot more than 32 GB RAM just fine (why shouldn’t it?). Please send me any scenes that you think might have this problem and I’ll test it on my 1950X. Frankly, this is the first time I hear 1950X not being able to use more than 32 GB RAM.
Please see attached another scene I’ve just tested. All trees and shrubs are unique non-instanced non-proxy objects to make it as heavy as I can. Notice the “Memory” and how it shows 54.2 GB RAM being used. Also, disk activity is basically zero so no swapping is happening either.
Fair enough. Good to hear you managed to solve it. On the two 1950X machines here we just installed the latest BIOS and left it basically at default (except for OC’ing the CPU) and then we installed Windows 10 and the AMD drivers for Threadripper.
Pro tip - if you have 64 GB on 8 sticks of RAM instead of 4 sticks and they are faster than 2800-2900 Mhz, you are putting more stress on the IMC and you might not be able to boot properly or get blue screens, restarts etc. You’ll need to decrease the speed of your RAM to 2900-2800 Mhz to get a stable system. This is what happened on the machines here when we used 8 sticks of 64GB 3200 Mhz RAM. If I use only 4 sticks of RAM (32 GB) I am able to run it stable at 3400-3600 Mhz just fine. Also, always check if your RAM kit is on the QVL list of your motherboard. Here’s an example with Asrock X399 Taichi.
Alex, have you tested how RAM different clock reflect on rendering in VRay? Somebody have mentioned that in Corona you can gain 10% just by using higher clock RAM (2600 vr 3200).
I’m not sure about RAM allocation, but you’d only get half the RAM speed if you are using for example 2x16gb vs 4x8gb, as Threadripper requires RAM running in quad channel to work properly.
I’ve got two threadrippers - the first one is running ok. A couple of quirks in consistency with the maximum clock speed but it’s still running faster than advertised. And I think the ‘problem’ could be related to the power management settings that I had selected. If I set it to performance mode, all cores are running at 4GHz even when idle.
Second one was Blue screening, but I’ve done a fresh install and in the last 24hrs it’s been working but it’s hardly conclusive. The motherboard seems particularly fussy about having the ‘right’ drivers. A friend experienced the same but his system is now working with the appropriate drivers e.g. if you don’t install the wifi driver it will blue screen.
I just tried a displacement map which utilized 55GB of memory without any issues.
That’s correct. 8 stick of RAM also run in quad channel mode BTW. So for highest possible speed it’s best to install either 4 or 8 sticks of RAM to take advantage of quad channel mode.
Also I ran some quick (emphasis on “quick”) tests with lower and higher RAM speeds as someone asked. Between 2400 Mhz and 3400 Mhz I saw only 4% difference in speed. So anything in between will be between these 4%.
This is getting into some nitty gritty stuff, and for most people stock settings should just be used and make sure your populating the dimm slots correctly (RTFM).
Also, just a side note: but this whole thread was started because someone heard second or third hand that there were memory issues with threadripper, followed up by no facts or evidence even though a great deal of evidence was presented to the contrary (ie that there are in fact no issues) . This is how bad rumors and false misconceptions start folks. To this day people STILL get it in their head that AMD and Intel processors render different resulting in different images (again, false rumor).
Let’s all remember to question, verify, and internet safely.