What's more important to rendering? (Computer Wise)

efritsch

I don't know if this the right sub-forum for this, if not, I appologize.

What is more important to rendering times? RAM or CPU?

I have a laptop with a Dual Core Intel @ 2.16GHz per core with 4 GB of ram. I am loaning it to my girlfriend while she is going out of the country for 4 months but she is giving me her desktop which is a Dual Core AMD 6000 with 2 GB of ram.

The Desktop has a faster CPU but less RAM. I notice on my laptop that the ram usage never goes above 55% usually when rendering.

So in the end, which is actually better?

oh, I'm using Max 9.

Thanks in advance for any insight you guys might have.

Davor

If you are using 32 bit operating system, it can not use more than 2 gb of ram. So I think you will benefit with desktop computer.

efritsch

I will be using a 32bit OS for now but am going to upgrade it to a 64bit in the future so that I can get more Ram.

At the moment, I am just talking in terms of Processor Power vs RAM capacity.

spudmonkey

RAM = more polys loaded, so more complex scenes can be loaded and worked with in the editor

RAM = texture memory

CPU = number crunching, so rendering times improve as rendering is just a load of maths

however, a lot of calculations will be stored in memory, so more RAM = less address swapping

Basically both have an impact in other words, and depending on the scene being rendered, either could be the bottleneck

[Deleted User]

Heres the thing... Both ram and CPU is important but for different things...

CPU is for the speed of your rendering. Ram is for the amount you can render at one time...

Different renderers use these resources differently...

efritsch

Wow.

Evidently, the laptop is 40% faster. I just rendered the same scene on both machines and the laptop did it in 3min 24sec. The Desktop did it in 5:13.

Ugh. The desktop needs more RAM.

Pip

Davor wrote: »

If you are using 32 bit operating system, it can not use more than 2 gb of ram. So I think you will benefit with desktop computer.

I've read that it is 4 GB in total - meaning if you have a 1024 MB video card, XP32 will for example list your ram amount as 3 GB.

I run Windows XP 32 Bit with 4 GB ram installed and 512 in my video card.
My computer lists my ram as 3,5 GB - which is consistent with above mentioned.

Mine is a stationary though, but I can't imagine why it should be different for laptops.

citizen

Pip wrote: »

I've read that it is 4 GB in total - meaning if you have a 1024 MB video card, XP32 will for example list your ram amount as 3 GB.

I run Windows XP 32 Bit with 4 GB ram installed and 512 in my video card.
My computer lists my ram as 3,5 GB - which is consistent with above mentioned.

Mine is a stationary though, but I can't imagine why it should be different for laptops.

You're both sort of right. All system RAM has to be addressed with a 32 address, which is up too 4GB. Windows 32bit only allows anyone process to access 2Gb of virtual address space though. In Windows 64 this is increased to 8TB. Windows 64 bit is limited to 128gb of RAM. 64bit Linux can address 64tb, and the theoretical limit would be 16eb (2^64).

Deks

Both the CPU and RAM are very important when it comes to rendering images/anims.

The GPU is primarily there to display things in viewports.
So if you have a powerful gpu, the view-port display of meshes/scenes will be better (FPS wise of course), but it won't do a thing for actual rendering of scenes to images/anims.

And indeed, 32bit OS (or x86) is limited to 4GB RAM (actually only about 3Gb will actually be usable) ... 64bit OS (x64) can have up to 128GB RAM.

It will be interesting to see RAM modules with 128GB RAM.

Don't say we'll never need 'em, because people's daily routines change, and our computers become more complex/powerful as time goes on (along with software).

Meph

To 'unlock' more use of your 4GB RAM, open your boot.ini and just add an extra line with " /3GB ". This opens the 3GB switch in XP32 and allows the OS to access the 'extra' lost 1GB

But seriously, don't go VISTA, install windows XP 64-Bit and pump as much RAM on your MoBo as as it can take. Also, should you still have a dual core and your MoBo can ahndle in, chuck in a quad core.

RAM's probably more bang for the buck though.

Georgefox

you can never get enough of either i have a mac pro 8 gigs of ram and 2 dual core xenons and i always feel the need for more if you have to choose go with the ram cause with a slower processor you can still render but with out enough ram it will crash

Deks

I would argue that XP is starting to look dated because it's less able to cope with large RAM usage compared to Vista.
This is the only reason why I use Vista x64 ... as I'm able to use all 4GB ram in my laptop (maybe 8 later on if Acer releases the BIOS update that will be able to support such a config ... because my chipset does) plus utilize my hardware's fullest potential as it's 64bit compatible.

It's a mean mid-range laptop.