Will a Nvidia 1080gt 11GB card work well for 3DL in DazStudio?
Mercblue22
Posts: 116
Hello guys,
I am trying to upgrade my PC with a new videocard to increase the rendering speed of 3DL scenes in DAZStudio. I saw an Nvidia 1080ti card on Ebay for $500 that i was interested in. My current card is an Nvidia Geforce 760gtx, 1gb card and I have 12GBs of RAM in my current PC, along with a AMD FX 6100 3.30ghz 6-core processor. I use only 3DL rendering and use 2-4 figures per scene. (Victoria 4 through Genesis 8) Can someone tell me if the 1080ti, 11GB video card greatly improve my render times or do i need to upgrade something else?
Any help is greatly appreciated, thanks everyone!
Merc
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Comments
3DL does not use the GPU at all, so the 1080Ti will not improve the render time at all.
It would make a very significant difference to the speed of Iray renders however.
Hello Havos,
Thank you for replying to my question and ah, I had no clue that GPUs have no bearing on 3DL renders. I have always wanted to try using IRAY too, but I know my current hardware probably is not recommended for it. -I did a few IRAY renders before and the intense heat coming out of my PC tower actually caused my comp to shut down- If I decided to upgrade to IRAY Havoc, would I have to also upgrade my processor, and RAM, as well? -I have 12GBs of DDR3 currently, if that makes any difference between DDR3 and DDR4-
Thanks!
Merc
The overheating is probably a separate issue. Chances are there's not enough air flowing through your case or something is blocking the airflow inside. Or your components could have a lot of dust built up inside, preventing cooling. If you upgrade your CPU/GPU/RAM without fixing the cooling problem it's going to get way worse. It may help just to add more fans.
Processor doesn't matter so much for Iray with GPU only rendering, and DDR3 is fine, but some more, like 24 GB, would be preferable if you want to use the full VRAM capacity of a 1080ti card (large scenes).
But case cooling is important so you'll need to do something about that, i.e. more and/or faster fans (or with temperature sensors), if possible. That your computer shuts down would more likely be caused by accumulated dust in the CPU cooler though, or just using an inadequate cooler. Or maybe a cooler that's not mounted properly or with dried out thermal paste. You could try to measure the temperature in the case, that may give you a clue.
Also check if there is room in the case for the card you choose as some cards can be pretty huge.
...For 3DL what governs the speed of rendering is your CPU. The more threads and higher clock rate, the faster files will render. More memory is always good as it gives you more overhead i once you start getting into larger scenes (particularly if using UE as it is very resource demanding).
There really isn't that much of a difference between DDR3 and DDR4. What matters more in this case is what are called memory channels. If you have 12 GB most likely it is triple channel memory which spreads the workload more evenly among each grouping of three sticks making it more efficient. (either 3 x 4 GB or 6 x 2 GB) Many of the newest CPUs and MBs only support dual channel which only spread the load among two instead of three sticks. Check your MB's specs as most likely like mine, it will support 24GB.
If you consider going to DDR4 you would need a new MB and CPU.
If you are interested in working with Iray, then yes, that 1080Ti would be a huge boost. Still it is good to get that memory upgrade as should you begin to create larger scenes. I read something a while back that VRAM for rendering is "mirrored" by system memory.
What CPU, MB and PSU do you currently have?
I recently upgraded my old system to a 6 core 2.9GHz Xeon (Turbo 3.4GHz), 24 GB of DDR3 1333, and a Titan-X GPU card. My case also has seven fans including dual exhaust fans on the top and a large fan on the left panel where the GPU card sits.
12GB is on the low side, particularly coupled with a card with a large VRAM like 11GB, so I would recommend increasing it. Upgrading the CPU is much less important if using Iray, as there is little need. The 1080Ti will render just as fast with or without the CPU to help.
I have the same card, and I always render with the GPU only, so there is no strain on my CPU at all. That is one of the things I did not like about 3DL, is really hammers the CPU during rendering, unless you limit it to just a subset of your cores. Now, when I kick off an Iray render my PC is free to do other work.
A scene that doesn't fit on a card will still render on CPU; fast cards useless if not being used. So... Before making decissions; work out how much your scenes take up, spend your cash accordingly, or spend time reducing the RAM requirements of a scene - Scene Optimiser can help, although it can be done manually - but there is the time-factor again.
Hello everything,
Thank you so much for all the replies, they were all very helpful in helping me decide on my decision to purchase a 1080TI card. For me, I have been using DAZStudio since 2009 and have really liked using 3DL. -although IRAY looks incredible, its very taxing on my system- I would prefer IRAY, no doubt, and if I can use that instead of 3DL, I'd be more then happy with the upgrade. I also agree that it would probably be a good idea to add more RAM to my system, which I will definitely look into purchasing next. (I have 3x4GBs=12gbs atm installed)
To answer Kyoto Kid's question, I have a AMD FX 6100 Six-Core 3300mhz Processor, my MB is 970 Pro Gaming/Aura and my video card is a Nvidia Geforce 760GTX 1GB and my PSU is Kentek 100/240V 1000W. (Wow, that looks like a pretty spiffy upgraded comp Kyoto Kid!)
As far as the overheating comments, yea, sadly guys, I only have 1 fan blowing outwards inside my comp on top of the CPU fan. I know that is not enough, especially in my bedroom where my PC is where it is hot even with my central air on. -I don't get it either, my room is the only one in the entire house that stays hot in summer/fall!- So, I assume that is not helping my PC and is the reason why it is overheating, shutting down. How many fans would you recommend and will it help is it is hot in my room throughout the day? (sometimes it can clock at 80-90F in here) Sadly though, there is nothing I can do about the extreme heat in my room, thank goodness fall is right around the corner.
Also, I think I will stay with the DDR3 Memory sticks, since there is really no big difference between D3 and D4, as to not have to replace the entire system.
I would like to upgrade to IRAY if this card will allow me to but I would be okay with 3DL too. :)
Thanks guys!
Merc
Also guys, i forgot to address the large video card comment made by Taoz in my last post. My current video card, Nvidia GeForce 760GTX 1GB fits well into my PC tower. However, last year I brought a Nvidia 980 card on ebay that was HUGE. I struggled to get into my PCI-E slot but managed to get it in there with some scrapesmto my fingers. Sadly, i realized that card was not much better then my 760GTX card and sold it ebay. So, I am hoping that the 1080ti card will fit inside my case, it will if it is the same size as the 980 one was.
Merc
..ahh, with the ASUS 970 Pro Gaming/Aura you can actually go up to 32 GB (8 GB x4) however you would need all new memory sticks. As DDR3 is pretty much legacy memory, it may be tricky to find a 4 stick kit. Most that I have seen go for about 200$ - 250$ new. You can use 1600 MHz memory (more choices) it will just run at 1333 MHz if you don't overclock the board.
Here's a link to Newegg's offerings to get some pricing ideas.
https://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&IsNodeId=1&N=100007611 600532698 600551103 600083963.
My board is an Intel PT6T with 6 DIMM slots that only supports 4GB sticks (6 DIMM slots).
Yeah, AMD was late in multi channel support as most of their CPUs (even Ryzen) only support dual channel memory. Your CPU is AMD "Bulldozer" architecture with 6 straight cores (no hyperthreading). Best you could upgrade to with the AM3+ socket is the FX 8100/8300 series (8 non hyperthreading cores). Hyper threading was not introduced by AMD until the Zen series which require MBs with either the AM4 socket (Ryzen) or TR4 socket (Threadripper).
As you are looking to go to Iray Then the 1080Ti would be the choice. The 970 Pro Gaming/Aura has PCIe 2.0 slots but the card will still work (provided it fits in the case). It may take a little longer to load the scene but it should not affect the actual rendering process.
A few examples of popular brands (all measurements below: Length x Height):
Nvidia Founders Edition cards is 10.5" x 4.4" (this includes those made by MSI).
EGVA Black cards are 10.6" x 4.66" Same for their founders series.
ASUS "ROG Strix" cards are big at 11.73" x 5.28".
MSI "Gaming" 11.42" x 5.5"
Zotac cards are even larger ranging from at 11.83" - 12.8 x 5.83 (height remains the same)
I would check the MFG's dimension specs before buying (Note: some are in metric so you would need to convert).
Most GTX 1080's are pretty huge. The smallest one, I think, is probably the Zotac 1080ti Mini, but if cooling inside your case is a problem, that particular card may get pretty hot, since it's small size and small heatsink doesn't cool it as efficiently as the larger cards.
I have my computers in a room where the temperature is between 80-90F / 27-32C most of the time, and have no problems with CPU/GPU overheating. Currently it's 29C / 84 F, I'm running a CPU and GPU stress test and CPU remains stable at about 52C /126F, GPU at 68C / 154F. See screenshot. CPU shut down threshold is around 100C / 212 F and GPU is 90C /194F AFAIK, so it's way below that.
CPU is a first generation Intel Quad and they generate a lot of heat (65 nm technology). GPU is a GTX 1070.
The case has 2 x 8" fans for disk cooling (in), plus 1 x 12" back and 2 x 14" top (out). It has a switch for low/high speed of the 14" fans, it's normally at low but when I render I switch to high. It's also been on high during this test.
I recently bought a computer with the GTX1080i graphics card and it has made Daz so much more enjoyable for me. Before, I was using an iMac without an Nvidia card and it would take sometimes 50 hours to do a render, that same shot on my new computer took like 20 minutes. I just rendered out a sequence for an animation with the ancient forest that came out recently with the atmospheric lighting, it has one G8 female and 7 G3 males and the frames rendered in roughly 28 minutes. Granted, it was such a huge scene that my computer would crash when it tried to change to the next frame for an image sequence, so I just had to render each frame individually. The other week I rendered a shot that had an ocean with rolling waves (I think it was 18 blocks to make up the whole ocean in the frame) and a G8 female walking down the beach. it was something like 800 frames and it all rendered somewhere between 11-15 hours (I just turned the render on and left so I have no idea exactly how long it took). So I would recommend the GTX1080i, you can pack in a bunch of stuff. Only once have I pushed it to switching over to the CPU, which I stopped it and just rendered everything in layers.
Hello everyone,
Thank you for your comments on my video card issue, I really appreciate it! I went ahead and purchased the 1080ti card and look forward to trying it out when it arrives next week. Kyoto kid, thank you for taking a look at my computer spects and commenting in them. :) I am glad thatI have suffient hardware for the 1080ti, I will definitely upgrade my memory to 32gbs and purchase them as a whole (4x8gbs) ASAP. I am reall excited to receive the 1080ti card and to see how much improvement it will be for my IRAY scenes as I rendered a simple figure with scene (a her in an apartment anf added IRAY lights) with my Nvidia 760gtx 1gb card and the picture took 4 hrd to render. So, i look forward to seeing what the 1080ti card will do with this same scene.
Thank you everyone for the assistance and suggestions with the 1080ti card. I now have a better knowledge of what this card can do in DazStudio and look forward to upgrading to IRAY! :)
Take care and have a great day!
Mercblue22