Workstation configuration ... Serious questions !

[hugon]

Hi guys !

 

Well, I'm kind of new on this forum, and pleased to see the huge community on it !!!

I'd like to ask you some questions I can't answer about choosing some parts of a new workstation I'll buy soon.

 

My main problem concerns the choice of CPU AND GPU ... At first sight, I have choosen a bi-xeon E5 2687W combined with a quadro K5000, but, the person in charge of the computer hardware and stuff like this in my studio harrassed me with the new Tesla K20 GPU accelerator, and told me that it would be a better solution to use it with the k5000 and only one CPU to speed up the render times ... As I'm an architect, and not an IT personal, I've listened to him, while being though dubitative.

 

If I'm not wrong, the CPUs are calculating the renders while the GPU is used to display it on our screens am I right ??? I'm mostly working on heavy scenes, with lots of highly detailed furnitures, which starts killing my old computer, and my boss told me that it was time for us to buy a new workstation, and guess what, I have the choice to get what I want, isn' t it dreamy hehehe

 

I thought that with a bi-xeon and a k5000 the ws would be a render beast, but I'm now like a bit ... lost !

 

Could you help me pleaaassseee ???

 

Thx in advance

 

Hugues

 

PS: We could have bought a bi-xeon plus a k 5000 and a k20, but the price would just be ... terrific !!!!

[hugon]

Btw, I'll give you the complete config for a better understanding ...

 

So, the main basis should be a hp z820 ws ( even though we care more about the components inside the machine ), which means:

A bi-processor motherboard

2x Intel Xeon E5 2687W ( they seem to be absolutely massive ! )

1x Nvidia Quadro k5000 graphic card

32gb of ECC DDR3 ram

2x 256gb SSD hd in RAID 0

1x 3To 7200rpm HD ( for the datas )

And all the casual stuff that goes in ... Hope you'll understand

[Devin Johnston]

Simply speaking higher end graphics cards will help you navigate your scenes more efficiently while the CPU is usually what renders out the scenes. If your using a program that can do GPU rendering then your CPU will be less important than your GPU so it's important to know what your methods will be. Having said that though the K5000 is one of Nvidia's most powerful cards so it's going to be able to handle a lot.

[hugon]

Thank you for the answer Devin !!!

 

Well, as I'm mostly using Autocad-Rhino/Cinema4D/VRay to make still images ( animation will come within the next years, first I'm gonna update myself to max which is more important to some offices than c4d ), I don't think that I should absolutely focus on GPU rendering am I right ? My main need is to have fast render times, and the k5000 should do the job in terms of "direct" scene display ( i.e. on the screens hahaha ), while the Xeons should render twice faster than a single one with the holy couple k5000/k20 ...

 

Anayway, feel free to give me your advices guys

 

Hugues

[Francisco Penaloza]

If you will use your workstation to render, yes 2 x Xeon E5 2687W will do great, the K5000 is the top of the line for NVidia so you are all cover in both ways. Note a side, not all the software are mutli-thread, so even though you may have 2 CPUs with tonz of cores, the actual software will only use 1 cpu, so in that specific case, have a high Fequency CPU will be better than having two lower one; but Cinema 4D and VRay uses all the CPU in render time so is better have more. maybe your IT guy was thinking on that, GPU rendering still new and slow plus it does have a serious memory limit, for ArchViz this is a mayor problem, for product Viz most of the time is not problem. So your IT guy may be correct in some way but it does not apply to your specialty, if you where renderings cars, and use IRay or Octane or any of those, yes a tesla card will be helpful.

[Umesh Raut]

Dear rebay,

You have got almost the top of the line thing there. I would, however, suggest you ask your IT people to check if your area has sales/service by Boxx, they have some well optimized hardware boxes for CAD and rendering workflows. And if our own Dimitris shares his thoughts here, they'll be of immense help to you too.

[hugon]

So, first of all, thank you for those answers guys, they helped me a lot !

 

Concerning the configuration of the workstation, we'll start with the bi-xeon and the k5000, because our main topic is "classical" CPU rendering ... We'll see later to buy the Tesla, if it's needed for sure ...

 

Thanks a lot !!!

 

Hugues

 

ps: i'll do my best in the near future to answer to the topics I know things about, this forum rocks !!!

[Devin Johnston]

Dear rebay,

Boxx, they have some well optimized hardware boxes for CAD and rendering workflows. And if our own Dimitris shares his thoughts here, they'll be of immense help to you too.

 

In my opinion Boxx is not worth the price you pay, yes they have a nice looking box and the insides are well laid out but you're going to easily pay 25% more compared to other options. I've had 6 Boxxes and none of them performed any better or lasted longer than the locally built machines I've had made.

[joelmcwilliam]

Just use google to back up your choice.

 

https://www.google.nl/search?q=bi-xeon+E5+2687W&oq=bi-xeon+E5+2687W&aqs=chrome.0.57&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8#sclient=psy-ab&q=bi-xeon+e5+2687w+benchmark&oq=bi-xeon+E5+2687W+b&gs_l=serp.1.0.33i21.8671.9030.0.10067.2.2.0.0.0.0.46.89.2.2.0...0.0.0..1c.1.12.psy-ab.hGpMd1DXwyE&pbx=1&bav=on.2,or.r_qf.&bvm=bv.47008514,d.d2k&fp=2ac823cc0a6a78e3&biw=1920&bih=1017

 

and you get for example this:

 

http://www.behardware.com/articles/865-1/16-cores-in-action-asus-z9pe-d8-ws-and-intel-xeon-e5-2687w.html

 

http://www.techradar.com/reviews/pc-mac/pc-components/processors/intel-xeon-e5-2687w-1074013/review

 

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/xeon-e5-2687w-benchmark-review,3149.html

 

I must say you do have a awful lot of money to burn.

 

Maybe an idea to get two systems. A cheaper (overclocked) i7 workstation and a small renderfarm.

Edited May 29, 2013 by joelmcwilliam

[Dimitris Tolios]

We could get into details and say things that many have read over and over...

 

Took you 3 posts to tell us the most important thing in your question regarding GPU rendering: which software you are planning to use.

 

But since you did, I can be really simple and efficient (rare with my posts): the programs you use, do not have VRay RT GPU compatibility.

Vray for Rhino does have VRay RT CPU, but not GPU. Unless you have-to-have GPU accelerated renderings are you are willing to switch to an external rendering engine like Octane, or willing to switch to 3DS and keep VRay, there is no real question here.

 

Even if you did all the above, you would probably be better buying 2-3 GTX Titans (not-kindly put = K20's reject brother based on the same GK110 GPU) that would give you almost 3x the performance for the same price as a single K20.

 

As others have warned you already, the GPU does nothing but accelerating your monitor's pixels, helping you navigate through your viewports unless you are using a GPU accelerated app (video transcoder, rendering engine etc) when it does "more".

The K5000 is curently the fastest offering by nVidia. Technically a GTX 680 (GK104) with optimized drivers. I would believe as good as it will get for at least a year or two - at least for this price point. If the GK110 finds its way in Quadro cards - as it did to gaming cards with the Titan - I would expect it to cost a lot more - something like the Quadro 6000 vs 5000 price diff.

Edited May 30, 2013 by dtolios

[Nic H]

dimitris is like a concentrayed ray of sunshine in a cloudy grey and stormy forum

[Fooch]

dimitris is like a concentrayed ray of sunshine in a cloudy grey and stormy forum

 

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