Hardware and Sales
Speculativism
Posts: 147
I know I'm slightly off topic talking about hardware but I just wanted to say that I've been worrying for the last few years about being left behind in a digital underclass because Daz was zooming ahead into new tech which my old computer couldn't handle and then, at last, I was able to afford a new mini-computer in a black Friday sale and it is superb! It's a Ryzen AMD 7 .
I was astonished at the little box which is so much more powerful than my old PC. The new one has Windows 11 and Radeon graphics and is able to do Filament and Filatoon renderings without crashing and Iray renderings very much faster than the old one could. Well worth looking at if you're looking for lower price with faster renders.
I used to have to go to Superfly and Firefly and other, older renderers to get any results done quickly, especially when I was trying to do animations. I had to use lower resolution figures and props and different software choices. Now everything is faster. Even Bryce and Carrara now run better and with less crashes.
Also the mini-computer takes up less space, is almost silent running and is using less electricity. Cheaper and better for the environment.
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Comments
I have two mini computers that I've bought within the last year. They are really nice and powerful.
Unfortunately neither mini PC will handle DAZ Studio.
I use one to handle all my multimedia files, using Plex. The other one I use to handle "paperwork."
Your Radeon graphics won't help you with DAZ Studio. You'll be stuck with CPU rendering, which is slow.
Remember that 3Delight is dead.
I'm well aware that my 6-year-old PC will eventually be left behind. I have an nVidia 1650 GPU with only 6 GB RAM.
I probably won't be able to use DAZ Studio 2025.
It will be slow if it works at all.
Au contraire!
The mini computer I've bought is fabulously fast and works brilliantly with Daz Studio, Carrara, Bryce, Poser and Blender.
I'm getting fast renders and increased stability. Also the ability to do things which my old Windows 10 machine doesn't do.
I don't use 3delight very often anyway but I've saved the older Daz Studio so that I will still have the option.
I see no reason why I would be "stuck" with cpu rendering. I was using integrated cpu/gpu on my slow old machine but now I'm rendering without delay.
Sorry to contradict, but it is an established fact that you need an nvidia GPU to use iRay "natively."
If you don't have an nVidia GPU, your computer will use the CPU to render.
Don't believe still? Look at the numerous threads on the topic.
No, Iray will render on CPU - it is slower than on an nVidia GPU, and some features (such as the AI denoiser) are unavailable, but it will render and if the speed is acceptable to the user that is all that matters.
That's what I said, and more than once.
NB: This is a happy thread, not an argument between boffins thread.
Anyway, as I was saying, this new mini-computer is rendering everything much much faster than ever before and is able to do filament and filatoon and also fast renders of iray and animation frames. My previous machine had an integrated graphics card and I was told by somebody at Daz that there had been issues with integrated cards. Anyway, the new machine is brilliant.
I'm certainly not "stuck" with cpu or "stuck" with gpu or "stuck" in any way at all. There is no sense of being "stuck" or "dead" as you put it. I'm overjoyed that I can now use the filament renderer instead of Iray! Although, as I said before, Iray is now speeded up as well. Happy happy joy joy!!
It doesn't matter how it's processing the data as long as it is processing that data faster than ever before I'm happy and certainly not "stuck".
The new machine is far superior to the old one. It doesn't matter how it achieves the result, the important thing is that it does so. From an end user perspective it could be doing it by magic. The "radeon" or "nvidia" thing is only a label attached to the outer casing of the computer but what goes on "under the hood" is, as always, an infinite universe of deep dark mysterious gubbins beyond all comprehension.
At the end of the day it does what it does no matter how it manages to do it. I'm happy with that.
The joyous wonderment of the thing is being, at last, able to use the filament renderer in Daz Studio. The improvement in Iray renders is very probably an example of the shortcomings of my previous machine.
Also Bryce is now able to handle bigger animation files from the Daz-Bryce bridge which previously would've crashed it.
nVidia and Radeon are internal components.
I'm really surprised that you continue to have such a negative response to my well-meaning information.
At any rate, I'm done with this conversation.
Happy New Year.
I started using iRay before I had the nVidia graphics card. When I got a newer computer, I believe I was able to use iRay faster even without the nVidia graphis card. That was good because I had scenes that wouldn't fit into the memory of the graphics hardware.
I don't know what that's all about. You give someone sunshine, lollipops and roses and they call it "negative"? Oh well, whateverrrrrr......
Yes, that's similar to my experience. It makes good economic sense that Daz invested in Iray rendering because it's very workable for most people. It was the right move for Daz I think.
It wouldn't be very good for business if Iray stopped a lot of people from using Studio.
Hi Speculativism,
I'm glad that your mini-computer purchase is such an improvement on what you had before. I've been pondering over getting one also for various good reasons but have reached a point in life where I don't want to buy many more things until I've made better use of what I already have. This includes software. Over the Christmas period there were so many software upgrades and other offers to tempt me but I managed to resist. It is nice that you are using Bryce and Carrara (and Poser, I think). When I first started taking an interest in 3d these were major purchases and they work just as well now as they did then. I snapped up Vue when it became free recently as well as Modo. Have I used them yet? No. These are an example of what I mean by not using what I already have.
Anyway, enough wittering. I do have good reasons to get a mini PC a few months down the line and have looked at performance reviews and prices of various models. The offerings from Geekcom seem like a good option to consider - or a 'benchmark' if you like. I'm not too well-versed in hardware specs. Would you care to give a bit more info on what you bought?
Happy New Year to all.
Edit to add: The computer would not be for DAZ Studio use. I have a sound desktop.
I also use Vue, Carrara, Bryce, Poser, Blender and various freeware things of various vintages. I never used Modo and it looks like I never will now. Vue is sort of like what Bryce would've been if it had been developed over the years by bigger money companies. I think there used to be a company years ago, called MetaCreations, which created a lot of these type of softwares and Corel Painter too I think. I was an art student in the early 1990s and we had Power Macs with Macromedia Director installed. Director was great. It had like rows of little boxes into which we could put a video clip or a 3D object or an image file or a sound wav or a movement file and then we could pull instances of these elements out of the boxes and drop them into the scenes of the movie we'd be creating. It was a good sensible system. It was possible to link a sound with a visual event, such as the sound of a footstep with the image of a footstep. I think Carrara could, in theory, do the same sort of thing but I never figured out how to get it properly set up for that.
The mini computer I bought was this one:
P4 Plus Mini PC Ryzen 7 5825U (Upgraded 5700U), 8C/16T, up to 4.5GHz, 32GB DDR4 1TB PCIe 4.0 SSD, Triple Display Desktop PC, WiFi 6E, BT5.2, Type-C which I got on Amazon in a black friday sale.
Happy New Year!
Thank you so much for your quick reply. Much of what is nostalgia to you is stuff I didn't know of then or now but is fascinating.
I rarely post on forums but had been kind of musing on starting an off-topic thread asking where people are at now in their creative endeavours. Over the years I dabbled in Carrara, DAZ Studio, Poser and Iclone with Hexagon for modelling and a little Bryce and some 3dCoat for sculpting. Some of these alone could occupy a hobbyist for a lifetime.
But things have been changing so fast with aforementioned software given for free. There is also Blender, Unreal, Unity and many other technologies to master. Then there is AI taking it all by storm, rightly or wrongly - I've personally left it totally alone so far.
Last year I bought a VR headset and have been blown away by the possibilities of creating things for VR use. (My old Version 7 of Iclone can produce side-by-side renders. These are seen as 3d scenes/animations in the headset but I haven't had time to explore further. There just is not enough lifetime...
Thanks once again for the info.
Once again, I've wittered on