The current state of OpenCL in video production

[IAmAndre]

Hi,

 

I'm about to upgrade my GPU to get a Vega 56. I'm getting it mostly for gaming and because my current Nvidia GPU seems to be dying. However I keep reading online that Adobe products work better with CUDA than it does with OpenCL. Is it still the case? I'm mostly using After Effects and Premiere Pro for my videos so is this card a good choice?

 

Thanks

[Princess Luna]

Yes everything Adobe greatly favor CUDA Acceleration.

[Streetguru]

16 minutes ago, IAmAndre said:

 

What kind of footage are you working with? If it's only basic 1080p or 4k H264 files it won't really matter what GPU you use so long as it's modern, scaling doesn't work sometimes with higher end parts.

 

And are you only gaming on a 1080p 60hz display? Because I'd go for an RX 570-580 in that case given that they're $160 or less, get an 8GB model in any event

[IAmAndre]

28 minutes ago, Streetguru said:

What kind of footage are you working with? If it's only basic 1080p or 4k H264 files it won't really matter what GPU you use so long as it's modern, scaling doesn't work sometimes with higher end parts.

Mostly 1080p footage but I also make animations with After Effects and the goal is to be able to make more complex videos later and then start learning C4D.

 

29 minutes ago, Streetguru said:

And are you only gaming on a 1080p 60hz display? Because I'd go for an RX 570-580 in that case given that they're $160 or less, get an 8GB model in any event

Yes that's my current resolution and frame rate but I don't want to upgrade anytime soon. I'm still rocking my 750 that I bought back in 2014 and I totally see myself using the new GPU until it has some issues, hopefully in 5 years from now.

[Streetguru]

14 minutes ago, IAmAndre said:

 

Then a cheap RX 570/580 8GB should get you by just fine until NAVI drops and hopefully shakes up the GPU market

 

If nothing else you could buy a used 1080ti on the cheap at some point

 

or if you really want Vega, Vega FE with it's 16BGs of VRAM is $400 or less at times on ebay

[LaFemmeEnVert]

1 hour ago, IAmAndre said:

Hi,

 

I'm about to upgrade my GPU to get a Vega 56. I'm getting it mostly for gaming and because my current Nvidia GPU seems to be dying. However I keep reading online that Adobe products work better with CUDA than it does with OpenCL. Is it still the case? I'm mostly using After Effects and Premiere Pro for my videos so is this card a good choice?

 

Thanks

If your primary aim is gaming, get the best gaming gpu you can afford.  For the question of whether Premiere and AE works better with nVidia or AMD, read the articles on Puget Systems website since they test various configurations.
https://www.pugetsystems.com/

[IAmAndre]

34 minutes ago, Streetguru said:

Then a cheap RX 570/580 8GB should get you by just fine until NAVI drops and hopefully shakes up the GPU market

 

If nothing else you could buy a used 1080ti on the cheap at some point

 

or if you really want Vega, Vega FE with it's 16BGs of VRAM is $400 or less at times on ebay

I'm getting the Vega 56 for €260, which isn't that much more than a 590/580 and more affordable than a 1660Ti, which I originally wanted.

11 minutes ago, LaFemmeEnVert said:

If your primary aim is gaming, get the best gaming gpu you can afford.  For the question of whether Premiere and AE works better with nVidia or AMD, read the articles on Puget Systems website since they test various configurations.
https://www.pugetsystems.com/

I did check their website but had doubts about their results. Bottom line, AMD performs worse according to them but on Premiere Pro for instance they said that the results could differ with non-RED hardware.

[Streetguru]

1 minute ago, IAmAndre said:

I'm getting the Vega 56 for €260, which isn't that much more than a 590/580 and more affordable than a 1660Ti, which I originally wanted.

I did check their website but had doubts about their results. Bottom line, AMD performs worse according to them but on Premiere Pro for instance they said that the results could differ with non-RED hardware.

Then just grab Vega, be sure to undrevolt it though for better performance. Should be able to drop from the stock 1200mV to 1100-1150 for a bit lower power and temps, which usually results in a more stable frequency to a point.

 

and keep HBCC on in the driver software, doesn't hurt to have the extended VRAM

[IAmAndre]

3 minutes ago, Streetguru said:

keep HBCC on in the driver software, doesn't hurt to have the extended VRAM

I'm not sure what you mean, can you elaborate on that?

I was thinking of just using the Balanced power consumption profile rather than the Turbo one. I've seen in a review that you can easily save like 30W that way, and like 50 by opting for the lowest power consumption profile.

[Streetguru]

2 minutes ago, IAmAndre said:

I'm not sure what you mean, can you elaborate on that?

I was thinking of just using the Balanced power consumption profile rather than the Turbo one. I've seen in a review that you can easily save like 30W that way, and like 50 by opting for the lowest power consumption profile.

You just open Wattman in the Radeon Software and change the voltage of the card

You should also flash a Vega 64 BIOS onto the card for better memory performance
 

 

 

[LaFemmeEnVert]

20 minutes ago, IAmAndre said:

I'm getting the Vega 56 for €260, which isn't that much more than a 590/580 and more affordable than a 1660Ti, which I originally wanted.

I did check their website but had doubts about their results. Bottom line, AMD performs worse according to them but on Premiere Pro for instance they said that the results could differ with non-RED hardware.

With Premiere and AE, whether you have a nVidia or AMD GPU, if they are equally powerful, you won't notice a big performance difference.  You will notice if you compare a cheap low power GPU from one brand vs high end GPU from other brand.  Also Premiere and AE need focus more on CPU clock speed and memory and how you set up your storage drives and kind of storage drives than GPU.  Now if you were using like DaVinci Resolve Studio or Fusion Studio or Autodesk Flame or Nuke or 3Ds Max or Maya or other apps that are designed to utilizse GPU power, choice of GPU can play an important factor.

[IAmAndre]

5 minutes ago, LaFemmeEnVert said:

Now if you were using like DaVinci Resolve Studio or Fusion Studio or Autodesk Flame or Nuke or 3Ds Max or Maya or other apps that are designed to utilizse GPU power, choice of GPU can play an important factor.

Maybe at some point when I master After Effects I'll start learning these. Therefore I guess the Vega isn't a bad choice. Good to know.

[LaFemmeEnVert]

1 more thing.  Unless you are working professionaly and need to have fast delivery because stingy clients are paying you by the hour it shouldn't matter if it takes a few extra minutes to render a project because you are using OpenCL instead of Cuda or vice versa.  YOu are buying a gpu for gaming.  me, i keep two separate machines. 1 for gaming and where i install and uninstall many different apps a lot and 1 dedicated for work where I am careful with what apps i install and cautious about upgrading when new versions of apps come out because I work professionally and have clients so my work machine needs to be stable and don't want to risk anything on it.

[IAmAndre]

2 minutes ago, LaFemmeEnVert said:

1 more thing.  Unless you are working professionaly and need to have fast delivery because stingy clients are paying you by the hour it shouldn't matter if it takes a few extra minutes to render a project because you are using OpenCL instead of Cuda or vice versa.  YOu are buying a gpu for gaming.  me, i keep two separate machines. 1 for gaming and where i install and uninstall many different apps a lot and 1 dedicated for work where I am careful with what apps i install and cautious about upgrading when new versions of apps come out because I work professionally and have clients so my work machine needs to be stable and don't want to risk anything on it.

I'd be curious what your setup looks like. But you are right. My biggest bottleneck is my upload speed so spending a couple more minutes rendering a video isn't a huge deal.

[LaFemmeEnVert]

2 minutes ago, IAmAndre said:

Maybe at some point when I master After Effects I'll start learning these. Therefore I guess the Vega isn't a bad choice. Good to know.

FYI, and maybe this isn't your case but if you are using a apple computer with OSX Mojave and want to buy a GPU for external enclosure or you have the old silver box Mac Pro where you can upgrade hardware, AMD will be your only choice.  Apple stopped supporting nVidia with Mojave.

[IAmAndre]

2 minutes ago, LaFemmeEnVert said:

FYI, and maybe this isn't your case but if you are using a apple computer with OSX Mojave and want to buy a GPU for external enclosure or you have the old silver box Mac Pro where you can upgrade hardware, AMD will be your only choice.  Apple stopped supporting nVidia with Mojave.

Yes I forgot that Apple relies on AMD GPU's. Therefore Adobe's AMD support can't be all that bad, unless they do it on purpose to annoy Windows users ...

[LaFemmeEnVert]

Just now, IAmAndre said:

I'd be curious what your setup looks like. But you are right. My biggest bottleneck is my upload speed so spending a couple more minutes rendering a video isn't a huge deal.

I need to upgrade my GPU but for now I have a quadro m4000 with 64gb memory and 8core intel cpu and SATA SSD for OS and apps, 2xHDD in RAID 0 for storage and nvme SSD for cache/scratch.  It still works well enough for what I do, including compositing and motion graphics.  no need to upgrade yet and I can edit 8K video on it in near real time.

[IAmAndre]

2 minutes ago, LaFemmeEnVert said:

I need to upgrade my GPU but for now I have a quadro m4000 with 64gb memory and 8core intel cpu and SATA SSD for OS and apps, 2xHDD in RAID 0 for storage and nvme SSD for cache/scratch.  It still works well enough for what I do, including compositing and motion graphics.  no need to upgrade yet and I can edit 8K video on it in near real time.

Sweet! My next upgrade is probably going to be an nvme SSD for cache too and more RAM as 16 GB gets filled quickly.

[Streetguru]

12 minutes ago, IAmAndre said:

I'd be curious what your setup looks like. But you are right. My biggest bottleneck is my upload speed so spending a couple more minutes rendering a video isn't a huge deal.

I use Vegas pro 15 since it was $20 on the humble bundle store and doesn't need a sub fee, works fine.

 

I have a 1950X and RX 580 8GB

[LaFemmeEnVert]

my machine only struggles with variable frame rate video encoded in h265.  recently i had clients who wanted me to edit video they filmed with their iphones.  When I did the rough cut on my MBP in Premiere everything looked fine, but when I took the files to my work machine, in Premiere the video was stuttering.  so not sure if it was the machine or premiere in windows being shit with variable frame rate video in h265.  personally i prefer filming for the clients myself so I can control the quality and acquisition workflow, but sometimes they just pay me for editing because they don't have time or money to send me out to the location.

 

8 minutes ago, IAmAndre said:

Sweet! My next upgrade is probably going to be an nvme SSD for cache too and more RAM as 16 GB gets filled quickly.

minimum recommeneded memory is 32gb, 64 is better, 128 would be great but can sometimes be overkill.  if you starting using apps like Flame or Nuke or Fusion, fast SSD for cache/scratch will be mandatory.  for these apps you need to read the recommended specs and ask on groups and forums where people use these apps to choose the right hardware configuration choices.  you can't just use any configuration.

[IAmAndre]

19 minutes ago, Streetguru said:

I use Vegas pro 15 since it was $20 on the humble bundle store and doesn't need a sub fee, works fine.

 

I have a 1950X and RX 580 8GB

I was using Vegas a lot at the beginning but Adobe products are good when they work (and I stress that part). I tend to use most of them including even Acrobat Pro so that's a solid package.

 

21 minutes ago, LaFemmeEnVert said:

minimum recommeneded memory is 32gb, 64 is better, 128 would be great but can sometimes be overkill

I will most likely end up with 48GB since I already have 16GB that I don't want to let go.

[Streetguru]

6 minutes ago, IAmAndre said:

I was using Vegas a lot at the beginning but Adobe products are good when they work (and I stress that part). I tend to use most of them including even Acrobat Pro so that's a solid package.

 

I will most likely end up with 48GB since I already have 16GB that I don't want to let go.

What speed is the 16gb kit? Because you might have trouble running at higher speeds if you start to mix and match them

[IAmAndre]

8 hours ago, Streetguru said:

What speed is the 16gb kit? Because you might have trouble running at higher speeds if you start to mix and match them

3200 MHz. It shouldn't be too hard to find another kit at this frequency.

[TehPlayer14]

People use NVENC/AMD's solution to render faster

 

in case of Adobe there is plugin for it by community

[MandicReally]

I just ordered a Vega 56 for use with Premiere and After Effects. I absolutely had to replace my GTX 980 and got a Vega 56 for $229 refurb from Newegg. I'll report back this weekend hopefully with performance but it's what I could afford right now. 

 

Most test charts I could find weren't showing a massive enough difference with Nvidia offerings to justify the extra expense (for me currently).