Daz crashes when trying to render 3+ G8s (ACCESS_VIOLATION error)
stemyl
Posts: 20
It is some time now that Daz Studio crashes when I try to render 3 or more G8 characters. I can work with them, set the scene, lights, and so on, but when I try to render, Daz crashes.
I have no problem rendering 1 or 2 G8 characters (2 G8F, 2 G8M, 1 G8M + 1 G8F -- no difference at all) within a scene with lights and so on. But if I load a third character and try to render, Daz crashes.
In the past, I've never experienced such a problem. I could render 3+ characters in the same scene. Maybe I had trouble rendering 4+ characters (slow downs, long waiting time before the start of the rendering, ..), but never a crash that I can recall of.
Trying to understand what is causing the crashes, I loaded 3 Base G8 characters, without anything else (base skins, no body morphs, no hair, no clothes, no objects, no lights, ...). The rendering works.
Then I loaded 3 customized G8 characters (with their skins and morphs, but no hair, no clothes, no objects, no lights, ...). And the rendering works.
Then I loaded hair and clothes for each of these characters, one set at a time. The rendering worked with 3 characters and 1 set of hair+clothes and with 3 characters and 2 sets of hair+clothes. But when I loaded the third set of hair+clothes and tried to render, Daz Studio crashed.
It may be a corrupted clothes or hair, but it happens with different content all the time, so it is probably something different?
This is the error I got: "DAZStudio.exe caused ACCESS_VIOLATION in module "C:\Daz 3D\Applications\64-bit\DAZ 3D\DAZStudio4\libs\iray\libiray.dll" at 0033:0000000077F9E8D0, mi_plugin_factory()+132864 byte(s)"
I'm using Daz Studio 4.15.0.2 (64-bit) with Windows 10 Home, Intel Core i7-8750H CPU @ 2.20GHz, 16Gb RAM. GPUs: Intel UHD Graphics 630 and GeForce GTX 1660 Ti {GeForce Drivers ver. 461.09 (released 07 January 2021) [clean installation]}
It is worth mentioning that my content library is splitted on 2 external HDD (I have almost 2Tb of content so... there isn't really anything else I can do about it), while Daz Studio is installed in C:\DAZ3D.
I've always used Manual Installation for multiple reason.
I suspect that the issues started when I was forced to install and use DAZ CENTRAL to install the new versions of Daz Studio (so around 4.14 I think? Or was 4.13?). But maybe I'm wrong and there are other problems (Daz Central caused many other issues, but that's another story for other posts : -p).
I searched the forum and found multiple threads regarding ACCESS_VIOLATION errors, but couldn't find any solution for my specific case. If I've missed anything, please post the link to the correct thread.
Thank you!
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Comments
Maybe try just that 3rd hair. Some of the "Iray" shaders being used on some hairs apparently have issues. Solution is to apply a different shader to it.
Also check that the video card drivers are up-to-date. Studio drivers can be downloaded from the nVidia website.
It should not have anything to do with Daz Central.
Thank you Catherine3678ab.
The videocard drivers are up-to-date (although I'm not sure what you mean by "Studio drivers"?).
I cited Daz Central not because I think it could be the direct cause of the crashes, but because it is very clunky in managing different installation directories and it caused other issues (in my peculiar situation, I'm not talking in general)..
On the hairs: I can check them further, with more trials, and and also using different shaders, ok. But the strange thing is that the crashes occur with different hairs every time, and when there are only 2 characters (with hair) there are no crashes (nor slowing down in the rendering process -- on the contrary, with 2 characters Iray renders are fast, faster than they've ever been before).
Maybe it's a memory problem then. I don't know. You could clear the log text file {just open it, select all, delete, save}, then load the items and see if you can get something of a log report for the crashes. Posting that then somebody who knows how to read log files might be able to help identify the problem.
If you don't know what I mean by Studio Drivers then you don't have Studio Drivers. We have to ask specifically for them. At the nVidia website there is a helpful app to download/install. When signed in, it will check for your computer what's available and download/install it for you {when you okay the matter of course}. Microsoft Updates sometimes replace the Studio drivers with generic drivers so we sometimes make a few trips over to nVidia to get back our Studio Drivers. As Daz Studio is specifically on their list of programs for these drivers it makes sense that these should be the best ones for us to be using for our nVidia cards.
you are not the only person getting the crashes. it does seem to be the same three person issue yet I can render with 7-8-9-10 even 11 characters then the program (4.15 pro) refuses to render which is really stupid when 4.09 could render a scene with 19 characters and scene. the cr4ash error is the same as you posted above. already updated C++ 2015-17-19 and that hasn't helped all drivers updated.
You could disable the Intel GPU in the motherboard bios to minimize it's negative influence.
You're right, the videocard drivers were up to date, but with the Game Ready drivers. I updated them to the last Studio drivers. Thank you.
I'll do more testings (starting with a clean log file). Let's see if there is any change.
Before disabling the Intel GPU in the motherboard, which seems somewhat drastic, could it be useful if first I try disabling the "CPU" in Photoreal/Device: (in the Advanced/Render Settings tab), leaving active only "CUDA 0 - GeForce GTX 1060 TI (WDDM)"? That way shouldn't it render only using the nvidia card? Or are they entirely different things?
Thanks!
My suggestion was about eliminating possible and believable suspects - If/when the integrated GPU is just sitting there, it is still reserving resources, address spaces, interrupts and it has display drivers installed for it.
As the problem is related to activities that are using the GPU and the GPU drivers, there is no harm in disabling the integrated GPU completely and getting rid of the possible conflicts and side effects at the same time.
Unchecking the CPU in "Advanced/Render settings" is a good idea
I made some tests on 2 different scenes with 3 characters each (previously they both caused crashes at rendering) and now Daz renders them.
The rendering process is perceivably slower than with 2 characters (which was not the case in the past), but at least no crashes!
So using updated Studio videocard drivers instead of Game Ready drivers and unchecking "CPU" in Advanced/Rendering settings tab seems to have worked.
I will make more tests. It's a workaround (and I can work again!), but still I have to understand what is causing a conflict and how to solve it permanently.
When I have more free time, I'll try to disable the Intel GPU in the motherboard setting and check/uncheck again the CPU in the Advanced/Render settings tab to see if there is any improvement.
Just to be sure - disabling the Intel GPU could have an impact on other programs/processes?
Thank you! : )
If you are not using the Intel GPU (no monitor attached to it), there is no impact other than reducing potential conflicts.
Well, I tried... but apparently in my Bios there is no way to disable Intel graphic videocard. I've searched in every corner, there are no options about it.
Therefore I tried another way -- from Windows Device Manager/Display Adapters i disabled the Intel videocard. Well, it disabled it, but instead on operating only with nVidia videocard, the system activated a "Basic driver" (??), then I couldn't even open the nVidia Control Panel (it said my screen wasn't running a nvidia card) and couldn't even open Daz Studio (it said it needed OpenGL 1.3 while I had installed OpenGL 1.1 only).
So I reverted back, enabling the Intel videocard.
In the meanwhile, the crashes while rendering came back! So sometimes I can render scenes with 3 G8 characters, some others I can't. Which is better than when I never could, but still disappointing, I guess.....
That's progress
Back to my previous comment about integrated GPU:s causing all kinds of problems in systems where they are not used... In this case combined with the W10 philosophy of "MS knows best", apparently the OS is in love with the Intel GPU, which may be the reason for your problems in the first place.
If you disable the Intel GPU again and then make a clean installation of the Nvidia drivers without enabling the Intel GPU, does your system start seeing and using the Nvidia ones again?
You didn't mention which motherboard you are using.
Motherboard should be MS-16P7 (that's what cmd "wmic baseboard get product,Manufacturer" says, at least), it's a MSI motherboard anyway.
Oh, just to be sure, I also deleted the Daz cache in the two folders in %appdata%.
A dumb question... Is it a laptop? because the that's what I'm getting with "MS-16P7"
Yes it is (apologies, I thought it was clear by the 1660Ti)!
I know it's not the best solution, but it worked till like some weeks ago.
GTX 1660 Ti is also a separate card.
I did find a manual for a laptop with that motherboard, but it wasn't very helpfull for someone not looking where to stick the power cord...
Without having better knowledge about the inner workings of the system and what can be changed in the bios, especially what are the two GPU:s doing, all I can advice is to update both the Intel and the Nvidia drivers (in this order), clean install and preferably without the "clutter", ie. just the drivers.
Ok, I installed the drivers in that order, with a clean install, only the drivers, downloaded from intel and nvidia's websites.
Now at least -- it seems, fingers crossed -- I can render scenes with 3 G8 figures, sometimes even with 4.....!
Problem is, while with 1 or 2 G8 figures the renderings are smooth and relatively fast, with 3+ they are really sluggishly slow (when Daz is not crashing).
I think the reason is that... Iray starts rendereing with CPU, disabling the GTX GPU. This is at least what i get from the log file. Here's a snippet of a test rendering (with 4 G8 figures loaded, only 2 visible in the frame, and environment, 1 ghost light and some mesh lights, plus some LoRez figures as a crowd). The GTX is activated, then
How could it be that the GTX runs out of memory (and... only 58Mb of free memory?)?
Even if you have the 6GB VRAM version of the card, it isn't that much.
Everything not hidden in scene tab (with the eye) eats up VRAM, even when not visible in camera
Lot of meshlights will cause dropping to CPU
Yes, I'm aware of that, thank you. But:
1) 4 G8 can really crash a GTX 1660? I don't think so... (and the environment, mesh lights and LoRez are not the problem, I could render in the same scene with 2 G9 without a blink)
2) just some weeks ago (I don't know, let's say till two or three months ago) I did not have those problems. With more than 3 G8 the renders were slower, sure, but not that slow
That's why I'm wondering if there could be some other issues. Incompatibilities, some mess with files or...
What happens if the 3rd is a Genesis 3 model?
You can check how much VRAM is used with GPU-Z (https://www.techpowerup.com/gpuz/)
I have an 8GB RTX 2070 Super and if the scene uses more than ~6.2GB VRAM it will drop to CPU, but this only happens with scenes that have lots of mesh lights and/or UV-mapping/texturing has been done without thinking the consequences.
Rendering in IRAY on GTX card uses more VRAM due to code added to emulate the missing RTX functionality.
The same.
In fact, as I discovered, it happens also with only 1 G8 figure. GTX runs out of memory and rendering is reverted back to CPU. Only it happens around ten second into the rendering and not at the very beginning.
I will try with only 1 G3 figure.
EDIT: Just 1 G3 M/F is fine, no "falling back to CPU". Plus,only 1 G8 M/F is also fine most of the time, now that I've made some more tests.
I've made some tests using GPU-Z as you suggested, and... I've found out that the GTX video memory consumption while rendering skyrockets also when rendering just 1 G8 clothed figure, without anything else (default rendering settings, no lights, no props/environment).
While rendering 1 G8 (DAZ log):
GPU-Z log:
Which hair and clothes is the figure wearing and what kind of subdivision setting do you have for the figure and everything that's fitted to it?