Hello all.
I would like some opinions. I am not sure what would be better in the rendering department. Would I be better off using a single high performance computer, like an AMD x2 or dual xeon, or buying 3 or 4 Athlon 64 machines to DR with ? Right now I am using an Athlon 64 as main machine. I am also using a couple of pentium 4 machines to DR. I do, almost exclusively, arch stills. I have not had any trouble with viewport performance, so I am mainly asking about render times with Vray.
Any input would be helpfull. If this is not the proper place to post this question I am sorry.
Hey daforce.
The AMD Athlon 64 X2 4800+ is around $700.00. And the a few hundred more for the board and RAM. But I can get full athlon 64 3400 computers for about $500.00 each.
I could use the 3 comps I have now to DR with a more powerfull com as main. Or I could buy a few more less powerfull comps to use with DR.
It seems to me that I would be better of with more comps to use with DR, but Im just not sure.
I think the 4200’s are priced at the sweet spot right now and they work about as well as the 4800. You may also want to look at a dual 265 which may be a little cheaper than two single 4200’s. They have been getting some good benchmarks.
I would recommend upgrading the main computer as you will use that primarily for running tests and the slaves for final render at a larger size. Think of what you use the most and how much juice you’ll get over your current comp.
There’s a price bell-curve where performance meets ridiculous price and the 4800 is there. The 4200 x2 and 4400 x2s are plenty enough - after that they raise ridiculously in price. 3800 x2s are suitable for slaves and can be had for $325 on pricewatch.com.
Stay away from the Xeons and had on over to our benchmarking threads.
yeah.. no point getting the 4800.. they are way too expensive.
Get either the 3800 or the 4200 of best bang for your buck. And the total cost for the X2 machine will definitly come out far less than 2 athlon 64 machines and faster as well
i wish it worked for me but there’s always some problem, conflict, bugs, unreliable behaviour, etc.
i gave it up because i want my workflow to be predictable, i can’t stand strange problems when a deadline is approaching.
I have to agree with plastic on this one. DR for me has been very unreliable. When I feel like playing around with it, it works great but it’s usually more trouble than I feel like dealing with on a regular basis, especially for deadlines. Maybe the newer builds will resolve this but for most of us, this is what we’re stuck with.
I’m shopping for a new machine to speed up my renders and I’m definitely not relying on DR to get me there. So rather than two dr machines I’m going for a dual opteron.
Considering the prices for a dual opteron 265 these days it really doesn’t make since to buy anything else. Unless, your on a very tight budget. But even then, if your planning on buying more than two x-2 machines, it’s actually much cheaper to buy the dual 265 opteron.
If you use Lightcache a lot, it’s much faster on the opteron’s. It uses all four cores. Remember, LC is not able to use DR at this time.
