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...checked the notebook configurator on Origin PC but could only select a maximum of 16 GB RAM and largest drive is 1 TB for all of the models, even though in the main descriptions it mentions each allow for a maximum of 64 GB RAM and 4 TB storage.
At least with the current release version of DS, you need 3 things; RAM (32GB or more), newish Nvidia GPU with (absolute) min 6GB VRAM and terabytes of storage space
WHen you mention that I need terabytes of storage space--is that for content or is that for running the program? That is, is it because it uses disk space?
I'm pretty much in the same situation as you, but I'm in the UK. Last year I bought a new custom PC from PC Specialist primarily for Daz usage, but as I'd never ever run out of disc space since having a computer it was the one thing I didn't consider. The laptop that I've used for Daz is slow with Iray like yours, which is why I went for a new PC, but only a few weeks after having the PC there were all those Daz Legacy downloads and for the first time in 15 years my laptop ran out of disc space! I decided then to switch to the PC which can easily handle Iray, but only to find it only had the same amount of disc space the laptop has! I've 8 times tried to get Daz set up on a 2TB external drive, but have failed every time for reasons I won't go into. So I'm now looking to buy a new custom 17.3" laptop from PC Specialist and so far it looks like I needn't spend over £2,000. So I definitely recommend buying from a company who customizes to your specifications like someone suggested above. Besides the importance of a good graphics card don't go for anything less than 32GB RAM and at least a 1TB drive. My laptop has 16GB RAM but renders still crash on complex scenes. I'm pretty sure 1TB isn't enough for all my Daz assets now.
THe reason I ask is NOT because of content. I have nearly all my content on an external drive and it's under 1 TB. I even have install files on that drive. I would like to get a 2TB (or 4) however, so that I could put my content on my laptop, and use the external drive solely as backup. However, I was getting the impression that the program might need disk space to function. Is that correct? I know that when I am loading scenes it is not just memory but disk space that gets busy.
...that's why I have a separate 240 GB SSD as the boot an application drive (where the Daz Programme resides) a 2 TB SSD for the content library, and a 2 TB HDD for storage purposes (rendered Images, IM backup, etc). I also have a 4 TB external backup HDD..
I hate to say this but your old laptop is ok for space reasons, but if you want to do Iray you need a desktop. If you can find a laptop that has a Nvidia 3090 squeezed into it that would be great but you are gonna pay thru the nose. The Nvidia 3090 is a power hog and a space heater. I own one and I had to take the side of the case off and install MSI afterburner to turn the fans to 100% to keep it from burning down the house! Conversly this kind of video card on a laptop will mean it has to throtle down so it will run slower to keep the heat down. So here are your choices, small laptop less power, or Desktop with a 1000watt powersupply and good airflow to keep the beast happy. It is up to you.
...I gave up on using notebook as the primary system for 3D years ago. because of the hardware limitations, display size, and the issue of heat dissipation (the switches for the keys of my old Toshiba above where the CPU is burned out because of he heat generated during rendering so i went to a secondary wireless keyboard). While compactness and portability is nice and all, a notebook is more limited when it comes to expansion and customising compared to a desktop and as others have mentioned less Zing for your Zloty than a desktop.
As to cooling there is little that can be done to improve the situation save for a cooling pa. underneath. The best cooling solution you can get is a notebook with dual fans that have an intake on the front and exhaust ports in the back or sides. Even so that is not the best solution as having multiple fans or water cooling.
I live in a small studio flat which is about 410 sq ft yet have two systems, one with dual 24" displays for my Daz work.
Notebooks are fine if you travel and are away form our main workstation but I would never again consider one my primary work system.
Just to add to the confusion. I use a laptop, and prefer it to a desktop, because it can be easily moved around. Due to covid I haven't needed to travel with it much, but I have had to take it into the spare bedroom for zoom meetings and extended presentations a lot. My present system is an MSI GT76 Titan with a 2070-8Gb, 128 Gb RAM, and 8 Tb internal storage (6 Tb external). Definitely more than I need for DAZ, but it's also my work laptop. If you're wondering what can be done on an 8Gb GPU, there are a few examples in my galleries. It also has a i9 9900k 8 core desktop processor.
A good laptop with a decent GPU can do a great job with DAZ (DAZ related stuff takes up very little of my storage space, maybe 1Tb). I agree with those who recommend going with a custom builder. That way you get exactly what you want and that can fit in your budget. Someone mentioned a Sager laptop earlier, they are great. A good custom builder for Sagers is Prostar Computers. I've purchase two from them and was very happy with both. My current machine came from Xotic PC, and the build is great, as was their service.
Content
...tried to customise one the same way to see the final cost but the site wouldn't give me the customising options.
Some nice workstation models with A5000 GPUs, but they top out at 64 GB instead of 128.
Well building a new PC is not cheap, even when you are cheap, do the legwork, and buy parts that have been returned to Amazon.
Also, the prices of even the RTX 3060 12GB GPU cards are nearly $800 (including taxes and shipping, the RTX 3060 8GB GPUs are close to $900 including taxes & shipping) when you buy them on Amazon or eBay so that means if you build your own brand-new PC you are out about $2000 to even build the cheapest you can find using recent generation hardware.
There are a few laptops you can buy for about $825 - $900 plus tax that use RTX 3050 / RTX 3050 TI GPUs that are about equivalent to RTX 2060s or RTX 2070s from last generation. About 6Tflops is the RTX 3050 with 4GB RAM. That is nothing at all to sneeze at in your position of needing and wanting to economize!
Another example:
HP Victus 16.1" Laptop Intel Core i5 8GB Memory NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3050 256GB SSD 16-d0013dx - Best Buy
$899 plus tax USA from Best Buy. If you don't live in USA you probably have an online presence in your country to buy this laptop from.
Personelly, I had gathered the money to buy that laptop or a RTX 3060 TI GPU (they cost about the same but I have the advantage of having build a recent desktop I finished in Feb 2020) instead watched eBay auctions and noticed RTX product is mostly just passing hands from one scalper to the next and the prices are starting to go down. It's clear there is a huge over supply of RTX 3000s series LHR GPUs that aren't being bought by home customers if you watch the eBay site. So with that observation I decided to wait once again to buy a RTX 3000s series GPU for much closer to MSRP and instead upgrade my Desktop CPU from Ryzen 7 2700 to a Ryzen 7 5700G APU for $369 at Amazon. Best part about that is I will sell my AMD Ryzen 7 2700 and GTX 1650 Super 4GB and recoup the costs of my CPU to APU upgrade.
I still need to upgrade RAM to 32GB to 64GB and SSDs from 2 x 2TB to 4 x 2TB and add a 27" 4K monitor to my 27" FHD monitor but other then those things my motherboard (B450) will be maxed out for how much it can be upgraded. There is a change the APU can be upgraded again in 2022 to but one that has a Radeon RDNA2 iGPU but I'll have to wait and see if that is actually an AM4 socket and not a AM5 socket APU. By the time my Desktop is maxed out it will have about $3000 in it counting both monitors and the preposterous 64GB RAM, 4x2TB SSDs but that's 3D computing for you.
With that I can bide me time to add an nVidia RTX 3000+ series GPU.
And yes, AMD Zen 4 Ryzen 7000s series is going to use a new socket AMD5 and DDR5 RAM for it's another set of expensive upgrades, if you need them, maybe you won't. However the the Zen 4 CPUs will all have integrated iGPUs like intel does but these will be RDNA2 arch iGPUs so technically quite powerful and fast, even having integrated ray tracing on board though bot to the speed of nVidia RTX series: however, we can see where AMD is going with this. There is no doubt there will be 4K raytracing APUs in 5 years time, although not quite realtime raytracing, yet.
Heat dissipation is the second biggest reason I'd like an external enclosure for a graphics card, with the big reason being upgrade ability (which is not possible in a laptop's internal graphics card setup)... but, again, I just don't know how well they perform, not having such a setup right now.
I can't recommend it since I don't know, but it's a setup that I'm considering for myself.
Pricing on standalone graphics cards is the significant negative at the moment, however. (And likely to last into the indeterminate future with the way chip prices are.)
@ nonesuch00: ...very true. Gone are those days when it was reasonably less expensive than buying a prebuilt or having a custom house build one for you. For a while memory was real cheap, not anymore. Then yes, there is the inflated cost of GPUs today. Most likely today I'd be looking at upgrading the current system. as I have the drives, PSU, and case. Considering pre Kaby Lake/Zen architecture to remain on W7 Pro, thougham aware that Nvidia driver support ends this fall.(have downloaded but not installed the latest Nvidia drivers).
Having a GPU with 12 GB of VRAM, not going to "back-pedal" to something lesser. 4 GB is sufficient for a relatively simple scene like single clothed character (occasionally two) sans HD or Sub_D, with hair and a fairly simple "low weight" setting (or HDRI). I originally had a 4 GB 560Ti installed and anything more than that usually dumped to the CPU.
Over on the Daz Studio forums there is a thread where one community member has been writing and testing a home grown plugin for LuxCore which looks promising. The render tests posted look looks very promising and as it is OpenCL based an older GPU with an older driver will be sufficient. It also is making me think about going the VM route with a W7 VM on a Linux host. So when MAxwel is no longer supported for Iray (already in "depreciated" status) I can still render with the GPU
Now if and when the 3060 gets down to around 350 USD then I'll finally consider one. For now, I'll stick to my old Titan-X. and rendering in Daz 4.10 to avoid having OptiX on by default as it significantly increases the render time.
heh, even paying through the nose you're not getting a 3090 in a "laptop" unless you plan on doing some kind of ghetto mod yourself that involves making a heavy suitcase-sized laptop without a battery. In order for them to fit something like that in a laptop, they would have to practically castrate its performance in order to keep battery use time, thermals, and weight down to acceptable levels. Even the laptop 3080's & 3070's are not as good compared to their desktop counterparts. Come to think of it, I don't believe we will even ever see a laptop version of an RTX A5000, which has GDDR6 memory and doesn't require as much wattage nor runs as hot vs. a 3090. One of the big issues is keeping them & the rest of the components cool in such a tight space. Anyway, I certainly wouldn't want to be the one carrying around a laptop like that; especially the PSU that goes with it!
Yeah I didn't want to steer them in the wrong direction since I know nothing about Sager laptops. I do know that I would never ever buy a laptop again(regardless of the brand) for rendering. The fans tend to be loud and you also have the battery to deal with, which can be a PITA when it comes to Dell laptops. Quiet laptops & rendering just don't go together.
For DS use, even if the laptop had a capable GPU, lot of RAM, powerful processor, enough SSD's and a working cooling system, it would be lacking in screen space, unless of course you could connect 3 external monitors to it, but would it be 'portable' anymore with those...
Digital storm
You I know what you mean.
I come within a hair of buying the HP Victus with RTX 3050 laptop for $899 linked to above but since I very luckily finished building a new AMD based desktop in Feb 2020 it makes much more sense financially and compute wise to upgrade the desktop I build piecewise. Eventually these organizations hoarding and scalping LHR nVidia GPUs that can't be used by cryptominers will loose on their gamble and I will buy a RTX 3000 series GPU for a fair price. Until then I will upgrade other components until they are maxed out. The amount of compute I am winding up with on my desktop is a bit surprising but I'm not complaining.
I look forward to next year when the AMD CPUs with RDNA2 based iGPUs are integrated. Combined with the improvements that intel claims to me making for their iGPUs it will hasten the dimise of corporate price gouging and these so-called VAR (value added resellers) scalping video cards. The performance doesn't have to be 3090 class, a 8 core CPU with an iGPU that has even the performance of a RTX 3060 TI is going to be enough to bust up the price scapling for good. Such iGPUs are another generation, or maybe even two generations out though.
Even so, I'll be able to test the LuxCore plugin you mentioned next week as the new AMD Ryzen 7 5700G and PNY 2TB 3x4 PCIe M.2 nVME SSD I ordered will be here and installed (instead of the RTX 3060 TI I was going to buy but decided to wait the scalpers out longer).
...will be interesting to see the results.
My concern is it's still integrated graphics which means it shares system RAM. The Article In Tom's that I just skimmed through mentions it's a good interim solution until dedicated GPU prices come back down to earth, but as usual, only gaming benchmarks were mentioned (and those at low settings) which mean little when it comes to 3D rendering.
For the time being, I'm continuing my research on the possibility of increasing the memory on my P6T MB from it's stated maximum of 24 to 48 GB which would be the least expensive solution for now (about 200$) to give me the desired overhead for the Titan-X. Once I can get what I feel is a conclusive consensus one way or the other, I will decide whether to go ahead with the plan or not.
I would never accept a motherboard with integrated graphics... They are generally meant for users that are not doing anything special on their prebuilt, lower price computers, the hardware and drivers tend to create problems when one adds a real graphics card into the system and the only upgrade path with them is changing the motherboard.
It's like integrating whatever up_to_date entertainment technology into cars... The average usable life of the vehicle as such has been 20+ years (here in Finland), and at that point, the integrated entertainment technology (even if still working) has become obsolete and a burden.
RTX cards are in stock on 8/26/21 at select Best Buy stores. One per customer. Get there early - https://www.pcgamer.com/a-massive-restock-of-nvidia-rtx-30-series-gpus-is-happening-at-best-buy-tomorrow/
Honestly you picked the absolute worst time in history to look for new hardware. That is not me exaggerating, that seriously is the situation right now. Prices are insane on everything, especially anything GPU related, and while laptops are not quite as inflated as desktops, there is no question prices should be better than they currently are. So this makes it extremely hard to offer good advice. With the current conditions just the act of finding a decent laptop that is in stock AND at a reasonable price is extremely difficult.
BTW, there are no 3090s for laptops, and there are no plans for them. Just like there were no 1080ti or 2080ti laptops. They are too power hungry for mobile. Besides, the laptop versions are drastically paired down compared to their desktop counterparts.
This extended inflation is going to do serious harm to these hobbies if it stays like this. The only people who can afford to pay the prices are people who make money off their GPUs, not hobbyists. While some people have ok hardware, there are also plenty of people who would like to jump into the these hobbies but cannot. The barrier of entry is raising. This is a field that can only grow when people have hardware to try it out! That is why Iray and GPU rendering was a revelation for Daz back in 2015. It opened brand new doors to rendering for people. I do not believe Daz would be nearly as popular today if it still only offered CPU rendering. I can tell you right now I sure wouldn't be here. GPU changed the entire industry from the top down. But if GPUs stay absurdly difficult to buy and stay at sky high prices it is going to chase people away.
BTW, there is one other option, though it is kind of bonkers. You could use a desktop GPU with an enclosure or some other contraption. This is technically mobile, but slightly dangerous. So you could try connecting an enclosure to your laptop, you'll need an extra power brick, too.
This video doesn't show a laptop, but it could be done that way. You do not have a m.2 drive on that old laptop, though, we can be sure of that. Still, you may have other options. Of course, you still have to be able to find a GPU to plug in the thing.
...all way out in the burbs where I live, a long multi transfer trip by transit (don't drive). I'm sure people will line up way early before the store opens if not even camp out the night before. By the time I could get there they'll likely be sold out. Not into sleeping on the pavement with my old creaky bones and joints.
@ outrider42: ...agreed. Bad enough we wnet though this with the Pascal series. This price gouging is affecting the lasttwo generations as well.
Memory as well, I remember when I could get 128 GB of memory for about what 64 GB costs today
I thought to upgrade my PC. I am sad to have not useed my GTX 1060 so much. These new cards are so tempting. BUT!!! they are no where available. The old ones aren't available too. The ones that are available come with hefty price tags.. upto 4 times higher than MSRP/MRP. I am so sad now.. really sad.
LOL, as if gaming and doing DAZ renders was actually more special then people actually using their computers to work for a living?
Yes, integrated graphics and discrete graphics have a big distance in capabilities between each other but they are both getting better by leaps and bounds and now, in the next generation or two or three (LOL), we will have AMD integrated graphics that are on par with current day RTX 3060s or certainly 3050s.
If anyone that renders tells me that integrated GPUs are never good enough I can remember many thinking the day when realtime iRay rendering would come was an impossibility, but as we see it's not. It's not an impossibility in integrated graphics either. We already know it's coming to AMD's iGPUs next year. That is not my conjecture, that is fact.
Looking at the amount of power the next gen Ada Lovelace cards draw the concern going forward for most will start being heat generated and one's electric bills rather than the price scalpers are asking. That's a huge change in capabilities if you ask me.
I can see the day when GPUs will start splitting in capabilities to special in different types of subject matter A.I. specialties AIPUs instead of GPUs as nVidia, AMD, intel, Apple, Synopsis, and others look to capitalize on A.I. capabilities and these ever more complex and specialized GPUs.
You know I bought that new AMD GPU & 2TB M.2 NMVe SSD out of my RTX 3000s savings this week just for you other folk that have been wishing for a new RTX GPU at retail cost because I knew as soon as I spent enough money so that I didn't even have enough cash at retail price for those RTX 3000s, of course they'd get some in. You could set your clock by it.
Do we need to be happy about that? I would have gone for AMD RX cards, but I read their specifications. Nowhere close to the RTX cards. And forget about rendring in Iray. Even standalone renderers for Maya and Blender recommend Nvidia cards. Why is AMD not understanding the purpose of its existence!! Why are they completely ignoring a market segment that they can exploit like NVIDIA is doing ...
But yeah no GPU renders like a CPU. And they never can.
Because CUDA is nVidia's proprietary API, so AMD can't implement it.