Why is the preview so slow ?

[Tartiflette]

The subject is the question :
Why is the making of a preview so slow under LW for Mac OSX ? :confused:
I've done test for all the day about this on a PowerMac G4/1250 with a radeon 9000, on a PowerMac Dual G4/1000 with a GeForce 4Mx and on my beloved PowerBook 12" with the GeForce 4Go 420, and it's always the same : When compared to a Pentium 4 2,66 Ghz with a Quadro 4 XGL 580 (I know, you will tell me that they are professionnal cards, bla, bla, bla... but wait for the benchs...) they are litterally blasted !! :eek:

Here are the results I've got from my research of the day :
When it comes to the rendering part of the test, the Mac is there, only twice the render time for my scene on the G4/1250 compared to the P4, and about the same time for the Dual 1Ghz compared to the P4... (of course, my PowerBook is a little bit slower, but it's normal gap...)
When it comes to the preview part of test, the G4 is so slow !! I have a gap of about 5 times (for the Dual 1Ghz) and 6 times (for the Mono 1,25Ghz)

Yes, that's exactly the problem !! Why the hell the gap jump from nothing for the rendering times to 5 times for the preview ?
I don't believe it's only the fact that there's a Quadro4 XGL 580 in the P4, that Make it so fast. Remember that the Quadro4 is "only" a GeForce 4ti with drivers made for professionnal apps !

I don't want to start anything new in the PC vs Mac war, because I like my PowerBook too much to even think get another computer to work, but I'd like to know how it's possible to have an enormous gap like this and if there's a hope to have quicker preview in the future...

What do you think ?

P.S. : the preview time :
The preview is 550 frames long...

PowerBook G4/12"- Geforce 4Go 420 : 9'25"

PowerMac G4/1,25Ghz - Radeon 9000 : 6'26"

PowerMac Dual G4/1Ghz - GeForce 4Mx : 5'28"

Pentium 4/2,66Ghz - Quadro 4 XGL 580 : 1'03" !!

P.S. 2 : Sorry for my english, I'm a little tired after all these tests :rolleyes:

[toby]

Preview is rendered with the graphics card primarily. The Quadro is about 4 times faster than a Geforce or Radeon, by my tests.

At home I have a GeForce2, things get slow at 40,000 polygons, at work I use a Quadro, it gets slow at about 200,000 polygons. Pro cards make a BIG difference.

[Tartiflette]

Thanks for your reply !

I haven't made tests with the P4 and a geforce or radeon card, because I didn't have any other graphic card than the quadro for the PC...

So, if you tell me is right (which I don't doubt...), we need pro cards on Mac OSX !!

It's the only thing missing when it comes to heavy scenes, because, as I just said, on the rendering side, even the "old" G4 is good enough ;)

Let's hope we'll see pro cards in the near future on our platform !


Laurent aka Tartiflette :)

[toby]

yes we've discussed pro cards for the mac recently, 3DLabs is apparently working with apple to bring their Wildcat card the G5 - don't know if it'll work in G4's tho

[pixym]

Laurent,

J'ai lu ton test avec grand regret, car cela fait un bout de temps que j'ai constaté que les cartes sont assez lentes sous mac OS X, et sont completement buggées sous Panther!
le 9600 qui équipe mon bi 2ghz est inutilisable sous panther, si bien que mon bi-g5 ne me sert qu'a faire du rendu!
Ainsi ce bi-G5 est entre 11 à 50% plus rapide sur certains types de rendu que mon P4 mono 3,06ghz Hyper Threading activé.
Par contre des qu'il s'agit de calculer une preview, il n'y a pas photo l'ATI 9700 Pro fait merveille, en étant plus de 3 fois plus rapide que l'ATI 9600 Pro de mon G5...

ENGLISH TRANSLATION :)
I read your test with with a sad face because a long time ago, I realise that FX cards are faster under windows than under mac OS X. Under panther they are quiete buggy!
I use my G5 2ghz dual only for rendering and it is up to 50% faster then my P4 3,06ghz Hyper threading On.
However, if you have to render a preview, the P4 with an ATI Radeon 9700 Pro is up to 3 times faster than the ATI 9600 pro under mac OS X...

Regards.

Eddy aka Pixym

[Tartiflette]

Thanks, Eddy for your reply :)

How is the life going, in Guadeloupe ?

I've seen your tests, and see that you've bought a Dual G5 !! How lucky guy you are ;)

For the PC wintel side, I think that, even if the P4 with the Quadro 4 XGL 580 is going fast as hell, I'll do my short film on my PowerBook 12" :D

This laptop is just the best computer I've ever had !! It's the right interface with the right dimension, and it follows me everywhere I go :)

I'll just wait a little (!!??) more when doing previews ;)

Thanks, and have a god day.
Regards,

Laurent aka Tartiflette :)

[pixym]

Mon cher Laurent,

J'ai du acheter mon G5-bi2ghz en remplacement de mon vieil imac G3/233 qui est tombé en panne pour la derniere fois!
Plutot que d'acheter un e-mac ou un imac luxoJR, je l'ai remplacé par mon mono G4-867 et j'ai remplacé mon biG4-867 par un G5 bi-2ghz avec 2Go de ram...
C'est vrai que c'est une bonne machine, mais j'attend que Newtek ou plutot Apple corrige le tir en ce qui concerne l'Open GL car sous Panther c'est une catastrophe!
La vie en Guadeloupe s'écoule bien en attendant le referendum du 7 dec...

Tu as des nouvelles de la sortie de la version 8 de LW?

ENGLISH TRANSLATION :)
Dear Laurent,

I have to bought my G5 2ghz dual because my home imac is out of order for the last time!
I took my G4-867 at home and bought and replaced it by my dual G4-867. Now the dual G5 with 2Gb ram replaces the dual G4-867 :)
It is true it is a good computer but unusable with LW because of the Open GL bug of Panther!
Life in Guadeloupe is good until the dec 7th referendum.
Have you got some news about LW8 release?

Regards

[ackees]

LW is the problem, it is simply not optimised for the mac. I am also using Motionbuilder for character animation and it's very fast, use the same models in LW and everything slows to a crawl. Macs have been short changed.