[feynman]

"I wonder how the Arion guy has managed it ... cpu + gpu hybrid engine that also works cpu or gpu only."

Dedication?

I wish I could put all these AMD FirePro cards to good use in rendering. Wishful thinking... : (

[Fernando Tella]

Blender does it also, as far as I know (and I don't know much), but with some limitations on features or materials.

[AndreD]

Blender does it also, as far as I know (and I don't know much), but with some limitations on features or materials.

Imho, Blender does not but Luxrender has a hybrid core..

[Fernando Tella]

Couldn't you choose with Cycles if you used CPU, GPU, or both?

[AndreD]

Couldn't you choose with Cycles if you used CPU, GPU, or both?

no, cpu OR gpu..
gpu without sss e.g. only

[Fernando Tella]

Yup, I checked now on 2.71 and it's one or the other. As I said, I don't know much,... I would've sworn I saw CPU+GPU in another version.

Well, sry.

[AndreD]

Yup, I checked now on 2.71 and it's one or the other. As I said, I don't know much,... I would've sworn I saw CPU+GPU in another version.

Well, sry.

At least, Luxrender has this option..

For me, the Blender integration is much more important than gpu rendering..
I'm planning to get myself an asus nx500 for rendering, video and photo edit.
http://www.asus.com/Notebooks_Ultrabooks/Zenbook_NX500/
If I have to increase the render power for complex projects, I will choose a renderfarm like rebus..

But almost OT now, sorry

Blender and Maxwell just would be too awesome

[Jozvex]

This is really good news.

Having a GPU powered FIRE will be extremely helpful for those like me who have a much newer GPU than their CPU. For people with multiple GPUs, even more so. I'm a bit addicted to renderers and so I own Octane Render and also play with Cycles in GPU mode, IRay etc and there are definitely some advantages in terms of interactivity, however the GPU is certainly not a magic bullet. Having a GPU mode for FIRE will be an excellent step up.

A possibly naive/unneeded suggestion from my perspective, is to try and keep the GPU engine as modular as possible right from the start, so that people can choose to turn on or off certain features (displacement, motion blur, caustics, dispersion etc). It seems that every added feature with GPU engines whether it is used or not, slows down the entire engine simply by having that feature available. I think some other GPU renderers are having to re-architect their engines to enable this modular approach and keep the speed as the number 1 priority. Forgive me if this is obvious.

At the end of the day, the Maxwell material system is still the best there is in my opinion. GPU speed is just a bonus for me.

[itsallgoode9]

This is really good news.

Having a GPU powered FIRE will be extremely helpful for those like me who have a much newer GPU than their CPU. For people with multiple GPUs, even more so. I'm a bit addicted to renderers and so I own Octane Render and also play with Cycles in GPU mode, IRay etc and there are definitely some advantages in terms of interactivity, however the GPU is certainly not a magic bullet. Having a GPU mode for FIRE will be an excellent step up.

I've been working alot in Octane myself lately and to go along the same lines of your comment, it's much MUCH cheaper to to upgrade GPU cards than computers. Not only is it a single modular piece, the form factor doesn't really change, so you can just swap out a new graphics card each generation for a very reasonable price. As well, GPUs are making large speed gain every couple years whereas CPUs have plateaued, comparatively. I have 2x 780 6gb cards that cost me $1,200 total which out perform my 6 computer render farm which uses 2600k CPUs and cost around $8000 to build total. Just to double the speed now, I'd have to find room for 6 more computers and spend another 8 grand as opposed to a bit over a grand for a couple new GPUs whenever a new generation comes out.

Now that 6gb cards are coming out and probably will be fairly standard next gen,(?) I've become much more interested in GPU stuff and happy to see that the Next Limit team is finally looking into it. Not meaning to make this a comparative issue between renderers, I'm just pointing out one of the major benefits i've found with GPU rendering in general.

[photomg1]

thought this was interesting with regards to networking gpu's , seems like the software is tricking the OS into believing the extra gpu's are on the same board.

http://www.renegatt.com/blog/


If nextlimit can nail gpu rendering its going to be maxwell all the way for me everything crossed . I brought up the hybrid based engine as it doesn't seem to be suffering from the same general drawbacks that most gpu based engines suffer from.