[arch3990]

Am I right, that Fire now supports GPU Rendering?

If yes, which type of graphics Cards does it support - only nvidia or as well AMD. Does it only support the "professional" line of the manufactures Cards - nvidia Quadro or AMD FirePro?

If it supports nvidia using the CUDA Cores on mainstream cards the best recommandation at the moment would be a GTX 780 Ti for about 600 Euro with 2880 CUDA Cores whereas the K5000 (1750 Euro) "only" has 1536 CUDA Cores.

Could you give any information about that topic.

...sorry about me asking again hardware related stuff

[seghier]

no ; gpu only for multilight ( fast preview )

[CodyKallas]

no ; gpu only for multilight ( fast preview )

Your right.

From the docs:
"Entirely CPU based

Instead of using GPU based algorithms, which force you to buy expensive graphics cards to achieve the desired results, Maxwell Fire is CPU based, and no special hardware is needed.
Maxwell Fire does not require you to purchase additional or specific hardware to get maximum performance. Maxwell Fire works on standard CPUs within your existing machine; it does not require specific hardware or GPU technology.

While GPU hardware has become more capable of handling some of the calculations a complex render engine requires, they are still not ready to efficiently accommodate all physically accurate Maxwell Render features."

So I am assuming, once it becomes more stable, which it has come a long way. They will probably be adding it in the future. I originally thought the same thing.

[JTB]

So, buying 3-4 PCs with top quality CPUs is not special hardware?
I think the only reason Maxwell won't be GPU based is the lack of displacement and 1-2 other problems...
I just bought a 780GTX and it is really fast... Using Directlight with AO gives you instant renderings... but even unbiased renderings is a matter of minutes...

There is nothing like Maxwell's quality... however I must say that speed is what I, and my customers need more...

[chedda]

Buying expensive graphics cards would be a joy rather than buying expensive CPU based solutions.I am going to look closely at Thea & Octane because they seem to have unbiased rendering using GPU. I will hold off on upgrading until i see it implemented.

[numerobis]

I think the only reason Maxwell won't be GPU based is the lack of displacement and 1-2 other problems...

Displacement is already implemented is GPU renderers - and it is fast, with almost instant changes, if you look at the feature videos of the competitors.
Maybe will see a Maxwell on GPU when nvidia releases the next gen chip "Maxwell" (what a nice coincidence ) in Feb/March which is announced to be able to use the system RAM. http://www.anandtech.com/show/7515/

And AMD does the same with hUMA... http://www.bit-tech.net/news/hardware/2 ... ory-acces/

[chedda]

That's interesting news Numerobis. I think it offers some hope. I use osx and it seems apple and the new mac pro are backing open cl all the way. Open cl has already been implemented in V3. I don't see it being effective to support cuda which is not cross platform. Also developing apps for windows and osx would be a lot more work. It seems we are at a turning point in technology where particularly this year CPU's haven't really gained much power. I noticed a haswell e i7 8 core chip is due early next year which offers some hope as a node. The GPU system seems ideal in that you wouldn't need to network and have extra machines. I have been drooling over the xpander desktop by cubix.

[JTB]

Maybe will see a Maxwell on GPU when nvidia releases the next gen chip "Maxwell" (what a nice coincidence ) in Feb/March which is announced to be able to use the system RAM. http://www.anandtech.com/show/7515/
And AMD does the same with hUMA... http://www.bit-tech.net/news/hardware/2 ... ory-acces/

Thank you for making me look STUPID... buying the 780GTX so close to the new release