In today’s post, we will be discussing about the best hardware that you can make use of for GPU rendering in Octane. You would be delighted to know that the graphics card GPU-based render engines such as Octane, VRAY, and Redshift.
They have matured quite a bit and are now overtaking the CPU-based render engines. They are doing in both popularity and speed. Which hardware suits you the best? What hardware could be worth your money is something that most of you might want to know.
Besides, what you need to remember when designing a new GPU PC device for yourself as compared to the CPU rendering PC machine. You may know that developing an all-around 3D model and CPU rendering PC device can be a straightforward affair.
However, you can optimize the GPU rendering performance if you want.
Let us take a look at some of the best components for the PC device with Octane, Redshift, and VRAY. Can you make use of them for other GPU render engines?
Best Hardware for GPU Rendering
Processor
As the GPU render engines make use of the GPUs to render, you may want to make use of the maximum core clock CPU. Some of them include the AMD Ryzen 9 5950X or the Intel i9 12900K. These GPU models can clock around 3,4Ghz (4,9Ghz Turbo).
First, you may think that the CPU indeed helps in speeding up the components of the entire rendering process. A few of them also include image preparation. However, you may want to know that there is another factor to think of when choosing the CPU, the PCIe lanes.
Because the GPU model is connected to the CPU through the PCIe lanes that are present on the motherboard, the different CPU models provide you with support to a different number of PCIe lanes.
Some of the top-notch GPU models require close to 16x PCIe 3.0 lanes to ensure that they work to provide you with a complete performance without any throttling of the bandwidth. We will read more on that.
PCIe 4 x16 Slot
The mainstream CPUs, such as the i9 12900K/5950X, come infused with 16 GPU& CPU PCIe lanes. That means you can make use of a single GPU that is at full speed having these kinds of CPUs.
When you want to make use of more than one GPU at full speed, then you may require a different CPU, which can offer you with support to the PCIe lanes. We found the AMD Threadripper CPU an excellent example of this.
It has the ability to drive plenty of GPU models. They come with 64 PCI-e lanes like the AMD Threadripper 2950X GPU model that can work & operate in lower bandwidth. The bandwidth speed would be 8x PCIe 3.0 (or 4.0) Speeds.
It simply means the GPU model makes use of lesser PCIe lanes. Typically, you may note that there is a slight difference in the rendering speed when you are making use of the latest GPU models that run on the 8x mode and not on the 16x mode.
When it is in x8 PCIe bandwidths, you can make use of 2 GPU models on the splendid Intel processor i9 10900K and the sublime Ryzen 9 5950X. However, you can also make use of the four GPU models in x16 mode on the Threadripper CPU.
Sadly, they do not come supported with this feature, and the optimum method to achieve that would be using the Threadripper CPU coming with an x16, x8, x16, x8 configuration. The CPU models have many PCIe lanes that are primarily in the HEDT High-End-Desk-Top platform range and are ideal for CPU rendering.
HEDT Processors
If you want to do the rendering process on your PC device, then you would like to see the fact that it fits into the GPU’s VRAM. That is because, the speed of GPU render engines is immensely dependent on the performance of the GPU.
However, you will want to see that the GPU rendering relies mainly on the GPU performance of the CPU, storage, and internet connectivity. The extraction and preparation of the mesh data used by the GPU load top-notch textures from the storage that helps you to prepare the image data.
It takes time, and some complicated images may need more rendering performance. When you are using a low-end CPU, RAM, and disk. Then you may want your picture to fit in the GPU memory opulently.
When this happens, the GPU render engine must be able to access the system RAM to be able to swap the disk. You will want to know that it will considerably slow the GPU rendering process.
Best Memory (RAM) for GPU Rendering
Please make sure that you have sufficient RAM on your PC device, or your system will not work the way you want it to. Otherwise, it may not help your cause for the GPU rendering at all.
Have the following rules in your mind when you want to optimize the performance:
- The RAM size must be 1.5 – 2x the combined VRAM size.
- Your CPU requires higher memory clocks that can speed up the CPU rendering.
- Your CPU benefits with more memory channels on specific systems that speed up the GPU rendering.
- You can use the low latency RAM that can benefit your CPU’s performance.
- This can immensely enhance the GPU rendering slightly.
RAM Speed and Latency
When you want quick RAM speed and latency, then you may want to choose the Corsair Vengeance Memory. Reviewers and users have recommended this model because of its immense power in GPU rendering systems.
But when you want to utilize the Redshift and Octane, then you might want to make use of a GPU that has CUDA cores. You also require an Nvidia GPU model to do that. A few versions of the V-ray come with additional support to the OpenCL.
Do verify the compatibility of the GPU model.
The best NVIDIA GPUs for rendering include:
- RTX 3060 Ti (4864 CUDA Cores, 8GB VRAM)
- RTX 3070 (5888 CUDA Cores, 8GB VRAM)
- RTX 3070 Ti (6144 CUDA Cores, 8GB VRAM)
- RTX 3080 (8704 CUDA Cores, 10GB VRAM)
- RTX 3080 Ti (10240 CUDA Cores, 12GB VRAM)
- RTX 3090 (10496 CUDA Cores, 24GB VRAM)
Though some Quadro GPU models have the capacity to provide you with more VRAM, the value of these top-end GPU models may not suit the GPU rendering when you actually compare them to the gaming GPU models.
Here are some features that include higher Floating-Point precision, ECC VRAM, and the official support to make them valuable. They make them helpful for those of you planning to do machine-learning, for enterprises, and for CAD users.
However, when you are keen only to use GPU rendering, please make use of RTX GPU models.
GPU Cooling
GPU cooling is another essential factor in ensuring that the GPU rendering process is done efficiently. You will be delighted to know that the Nvidia GPU models have a sublime boosting technology that makes use of the GPU to a certain degree within a predefined temperature.
You need to make sure that your GPU models remain cool. Because it enhances the performance of the GPU models. This can be observed usually in the laptop models, where the cooling is pretty limited.
This is especially in gaming laptops. Sometimes, the GPU models in them can get extraordinarily overheated and cause a rise in the temperature. When you want to do rendering on your laptop, then you would want to make use of it.
Power Supply
You would want to make sure to get a sufficient power supply for your system. That is because most of the GPU models come with a primary power consumption of around 180-250W. However, the Nvidia RTX 3080 GPU model can tend to consume more power.
Some of the best makers you can benefit from include Corsair, beQuiet, and Seasonic. These are some of the best units you can find in the market for 2022. Of course, you can get to choose other manufacturers as and when you want.
Motherboard & PCIe-Lanes
The motherboard must come with the right amount of PCIe lanes that do not share the lanes with the SATA and the M.2 slots. You may want to make sure that the proper kind of PCIe configurations are present on the motherboard.
You see, a few of them come with the 4 physical PCIe slots but cannot support more than one of the x16 PCIe cards. The best way to sort out things would be to check the manufacturer’s website about the motherboard specifications.
This can help you understand more about the multi-GPU configuration that you actually want to be supported. Here, you can make use of 1 GPU in x16 mode. Please note that the 28-PCIe-lane CPU model it can provide you with adequate support for several kinds of GPU configurations that are present on the 40-lane CPU.
You would want to know that the latest AMD Threadripper CPU models come with massive 64 PCIe lanes for operation on your GPU models. When you want to make use of more, you need to make use of the Epyc or Xeon route.
PCIe-Lane Conclusion
If you want to make use of the PCIe lane in the multi-GPU setups, then you will want to ensure that you have a CPU with lots of PCIe lanes. This is, of course, if you have a motherboard that comes having PLX chips.
When you run the GPU models in x8 Mode instead of x16, then it may operate somewhat slower than what it is supposed to on most of the GPUs. However, the PLX chips do not increase the GPU bandwidth to the CPU.
Speed up your multi-GPU Render times
Please do understand that most of the GPUs present in the market do not come with the proper scaling. Sometimes, you have GPU models that can render the pictures 2 times quicker than what is typically accepted.
But when you have 4 GPU models, it can render close to 5 times quicker.
Multi-GPU scaling
When you have several GPUs to communicate the same task for rendering, you will want to know that it can affect performance. It may affect one of the GPUs in a 4-GPU for managing decisions.
You can consider making use of a 3D-Software to have this kind of feature built in. When it is not, you can also make use of a Render Manager like the Thinkbox Deadline. It is free to use for up to 2 nodes.
GPUs per task
You will want to enhance your system RAM to ensure that you have a powerful CPU model because it requires the proper amount of RAM and CPU performance. You can refer to the internet for more on that.
PCIe Gen 4.0 compatibility issues
When you make use of the latest motherboard, then you will want to know that it can have several GPU models to it. But you do not have to plug them on the side. To do that, you can refer to some kind of tutorial.
Redshift vs Octane
Do you want to go with the Redshift or Octane? We recommend that you make use of the Redshift more often than Octane. Because when your tasks require more complicated material setup and compositing, then it can come in quite helpful.
However, Octane is fantastic for getting opulent results quickly when you are out there. This was our personal thought. We may accept that if some of the users might find Octane slightly better than Redshift. It is entirely your call.
Custom PC-Build
When you can find the PC components that are under your budget, then you may want to make use of the PC builder tool. You will want to know that the primary use of the tool is that you can use the PC device to adjust your budget to design the PC that you want.
FAQs
This depends on the render engine that you are using. When you are making use of a GPU render engine, including Octane, Redshift, and Cycles GPU, it is considerably more critical for rendering than the CPU.
Likewise, it is crucial for the CPU render engines, including the VRAY CPU, Arnold CPU, and Cycles CPU. However, the CPU plays a significant role in enhancing the GPU render performance. The CPUs with high single-core performance are not a hindrance to the GPUs.
Yes, the RTX is better than GTX for rendering. The Nvidia RTX GPUs tend to do better in GPU rendering than GTX GPUs. That is because the RTX GPUs are somewhat higher in features and expensive.
Besides, they come with ray tracing cores that power up the render performance for the engines are supported.
Yes, using more RAM does help for the cause of rendering. That is because when you have less RAM in the first place, then you can make use of additional RAM on your PC device. The reason is that the RAM only bottlenecks performance when it is complete, and data needs to be swapped.
When you have a 3D scene that requires around 16GB RAM for rendering, then you can consider using 32, 64, or 128GB RAM. They can immensely enhance the already provided opulent scene.
Like RAM, the VRAM benefits from enhancing the performance of the PC device when you do not have much to start with. When the image or the picture output is well, you may consider having a GPU with more VRAM as it may impact the performance slightly (given all other specifications are the same).
The GPU render engines may be able to utilize large ray trees or other optimizations when you have more additional VRAM. Based on the render engine, you can notice that there is a slight increase in the speed of having more VRAM, even though the image is simple.
The GeForce RTX 3090 24GB graphics card is the best for v-ray rendering. Users tend to prefer this card because of its ability to get things done in a better manner on their PC devices. Besides giving you with a good performance, they also have a tremendous 24GB of memory.
The Nvidia RTX A5000 24GB is another option for those of you who require several video cards in the same PC device. You may want to use Nvidia’s professional GPUs as a spectacular option.
The Intel Core i9 12th Gen that can go up to 16 cores is the best for v-ray rendering. You can make use of the graphics cards that come up to 2x NVIDIA RTX 3070, 3080, 3090, A5000, and A6000.
Please make sure that they have a GPU cooling feature in them and the CPU water cooling technology infused in them.
The Octane render makes use of the GPU for rendering. But it does not make use of the CPU, apart from the scene loading. Moreover, you have a more powerful graphics card or the multiple GPUs required to increase the Octane render rendering performance.
The v-ray makes use of the CPU only and does not need the GPU to make any progress. But the v-ray GPU makes use of the GPU and the CPU if it wants. In this sense, it can work on both the GPU & CPU.
The cores depend on the kind of rendering that you would want to do. You can make use of the PC device or laptop of your choice. Please make use of a workstation-class device because of the elements & cooling technology work better on them.
These machines can help you with compute-intensive workloads. Most of the laptops present in today’s market are ideal for only 4 CPU cores and 32GB RAM. They are suitable only for mild entry-level rendering.
You will benefit from the Nvidia graphics cards if you are a graphic designer, 3D content creator, or somebody involved in graphic works. They can give you the right kind of rendering speed.
Some of them include Nvidia RTX 3080, Nvidia RTX 3090, Nvidia RTX 3070, and the Nvidia RTX 3080 Ti.
Summing Up
We read about the GPU rendering in Octane, Redshift, and V-Ray in the post. Moreover, we also read about some of the best hardware for GPU rendering in Octane. As you can note, the RTX cards are not only better for graphics but for traditional rendering performance.
Conclusion
This is it. We have ended our discussion on GPU rendering in Octane, Redshift, and V-Ray. You have several ways to view the data you get from the Octane, Redshift, and V-Ray. There are tons of things that you can do by viewing results on the benchmark results page when you even run the test.
With the help of the filtering tool, you can isolate the hardware you want. That can be done with the help of the different ranges of speeds. Moreover, you can compare different types of GPUs.
There is no denying the fact that the latest version of the Octane, Redshift and VRAY has enabled many users to work efficiently; hardware manufacturers, we will do our best to provide you with the latest on them.
There is the hardware that we all are trying to learn & understand. Moreover, we want to take advantage of it. Which one of the three hardware did you like? Have you already used any of them before?
Please do tell us about your experience in the comments section. We would delight to hear from you.
James Smith has always been intrigued by electronic products since his childhood. After his post graduation in electronics from a popular university, he decided to pursue a career in the electronics sector. But his calling for writing about these marvellous pieces of work got the better of him. That is how UBG was started. With a writing career spanning more than 12 years, James has worked on several hundred product reviews. During his free time, he like to spend time with his pet dog and relax in the swimming pool.