Is my hardware strong enough?
elasaryakopow
Posts: 0
Hi,
I wanted to know if my hardware is strong enough to render complicated scenes in normal amount of time.
RTX 2060 6GB GPU
i7 10th gen with now 32GB RAM
2 TB SSD
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Comments
Complicated scenes... No, you need twice as much VRAM (or more)
@elasaryakopow – Your system is similar to mine. I have an Intel i7 9th gen with 16 GB of RAM, an RTX 2060 with 6GB VRAM, an internal SSD (boot) with 500 GB, an internal HDD with 1 TB, and an external HDD with 5 TB where almost all of my Daz Studio and Poser Content is stored.
I am a hobbyist at this stuff and now retired so I can spend as much time with it as desired. More and more recent content that I buy in the DAZ3D store taxes my system severely if I try to view it in the viewport in Iray preview mode. To help me with this, I have purchased several utilities in the DAZ3D store to help me lighten the load. In somewhat decreasing order of frequency of use, the principal ones are
You may find one or more of these helpful to you.
Also, to keep an eye on how the memory in my GPU and CPU is being used, I've installed GPU-Z (free). It provides much more usedul information than does the Performance tab in the Windows Task Manager. You can download it at https://www.techpowerup.com/gpuz .
Your weakest link hardware wise is your GPU as you do have a fair amount of RAM and your CPU is still pretty competent.
The biggest limitation you're going to have is the amount of VRAM on the RTX 2060 (it's not really a GPU that has the kind of stuff 3D renderers absolutely love despite benefiting from some of the RTX features that Daz Studio does put to good use) , specially with some of the newer stuff (like the skin micro detail maps on Genesis 9 characters - which albiet totally ovekill - because 8K textures are more a resource hog than a mindblowing feature)
The biggest thing to keep in mind is how long your GPU will take to Render (depending on how complex your scenes are) If you don't mind having to hang on you could probably do more stuff than you would initially imagine.
Even if youi get a 4090 (the best GPU there is), I think you will still stuggle since it seems your expectations are higher than the reality. You say complicated scenes, not sure what that means, but assets used for figures and environments are all made differently depening on the PA and as such use different amounts of resources. You could have an interior with 3 figures fully clothed and with hair and it will vary on the amount of resources used depending on which assets you used and who created them.
As for "normal" amount of time, that would depend on what is in the scene and your definition on what a normal amount of time is to you. I have a 2080ti and it's not unusual for a scene with an environment and 2 to 3 figures to take 30 minutes or more, especially if using dforce items or lots of lights.
Daz Studio is free. I would suggest installing it and the essential packs and play around with it to see what you can and cannot do
You can also use older products that don't tax a machine as much as newer stuff does. The older stuff has fewer poligons in many cases and smaller textures.
A few things to consider since you didn't exactly say how complicated you meant. How real do you want the renders, since the more real you go the higher the texture count, as in 1k 2k 4k and 8k textures, higher you go the more your machine struggles. How much do you have in your scene, as in people as well as props, the more people you have the more your machine struggles. Finally there's the lights, they can be a pain when it comes to how well your renders turn out. You may have to deal with the dreaded noise, that includes the amount of reflection you have.
There's more to consider when you talk about complicated. Think more information would be useful here.
32GB's isn't a "fair amount". In practice it is minimum for latest versions of DS/Iray and relatively recent assets.
Really? I haven't seen any mention anywhere that 32GB is a minimum (or even a requirement for either DS or Iray or even DS assets)
I have 24 GB of RAM in my machine (and have had less) and it never stopped me from using DS.
I meant in general terms 32GB's isn't considered a minimum by any chance, unless you're a modern gamer or create content/do professional video or 3D with your computer.
A lot of users work with laptops and even the "average" tier models have 16GB of system memory and typically have GPUs with less than 8GB of VRAM
A DS scene easily takes 12-16GB's of RAM without it being 'large' or 'complicated'. Together with the baseload from Windows and programs, one is already over 16GB's and using virtual memory (ie. ones storage drives)
The next biggest (recommended) amount of RAM is 32GB's.
Sure, one can run DS on lesser computers, if one doesn't mind that the computer is struggling or one works only with small and lightweight scenes
Generally if you're running a GPU with low amounts of VRAM which is the main focus when it comes to DAZ Studio considering you're using iray (and also the fact that most CPUs are considerably slower to perform iray Renders, even modern Behemoths like the Ryzen 9 7950X when compared to a powerful GPU) you're not likely going to go too complex with Scenes to begin with. And there are ways to reduce texture resolution so the RAM usage estimated figures can vary quite drasticaly.
Another thing to consider is although an unhealthy amount of people have the habit of having browser tabs open and other stuff running while playing games without no real need to do so and that can surely hog computer resources and trying that while doing renders is a guaranteed no-no.
Even a fair bit of Tech Reviewers have 32 GB of memory on their test Systems so if 32 was an actual minimum, they would all probably be using 64 GB if not more for a while.
That's almost like saying 1440p is a well known resolution standard or 4k is when both of these (the latter way more than the former but still) are pretty much a niche thing.
There are lots of folks with machines with GPUs like 1060's or similar with only 6GB of VRAM and 16 GB of System memory.
I used to do 3d models quite often on machine that had a Core2Duo and only 6GB of system memory for example (a lot of people would lose it and say that's crazy or impossible)
I'm not talking about complex scenes.
What gamers, tech reviewers, users of other software are using or get by with, has nothing to do with using Daz Studio.