Spec Check

[3deyoung]

CPU               Threadripper 1900x (Liquid Cooled)

MOBO            Zenith Extreme

RAM               32G

Storage          256G samsung 970 evo nvme (Boot), 2T samsung 970 evo nvme raid 0, 2T WD sata HDD (Backup; this is going to be replaced by an external SSD)

Video Card     Titan X (pascal) 

OS                  Windows 10 pro

2 Monitors / 1 DVI, 1 HDMI

I would like to have 4 monitors at some point, but its not a must.

 

Build is operational. First build in a long time, and a LOT has changed. This is for professional use and I specialize in simulating and rendering natural (and supernatural) phenomenon. ie; fire, water, smoke, ... magic... using various 3d and compositing software.

 

I want to add at least 1 more Titan X(p?) or can I get away with running 1 Titan X and 1 GTX 1080 in SLI? 

 

My biggest concern is maxing out my PCIe lanes. I found this:

https://wccftech.com/amd-launches-ryzen-threadripper-1900x-8-core-processor-with-64-pcie-lanes/

 

I'm not sure what to make of this. It says 7 simultaneous devices, but nothing there adds up to 7. It seems to suggest I am capped at 2 gfx cards in my current configuration. Is that correct?

 

Thanks,

3d

 

 

[emosun]

7 minutes ago, 3deyoung said:

I want to add at least 1 more Titan X(p?) or can I get away with running 1 Titan X and 1 GTX 1080 in SLI? 

no you only run the same gpu in sli not mismatched gpus

[Taf the Ghost]

1900X is the worst SKU for Threadripper. You have to be running some really strange workload for that to make sense. (The SKU works well for NVMe storage servers.) You also should at least move to the 2920X for the better IMC.

[Jurrunio]

9 minutes ago, 3deyoung said:

or can I get away with running 1 Titan X and 1 GTX 1080 in SLI? 

Rendering software don't give a damn about SLI or Crossfire, you can slap in 1050ti if you want to and it will still be used properly.

 

10 minutes ago, 3deyoung said:

I'm not sure what to make of this. It says 7 simultaneous devices, but nothing there adds up to 7. It seems to suggest I am capped at 2 gfx cards in my current configuration. Is that correct?

No, that's merely an example. Threadripper's 64 lanes is not all used for PCIe slots, instead 4 of them reserved for the X399 chipset (so SATA ports, USB ports etc), 12 for PCIe storage, 48 for GPUs. There's no fixed number of lanes a GPU needs in order to work, so while 48 lanes is only enough for x16 bandwidth for 3 graphics cards, you can use 6 with x8 bandwidth instead, or even other combinations as long as it doesnt exceed 48 in total..

[3deyoung]

Thanks for the responses!

 

@Jurrunio : So an external cluster like this: http://amfeltec.com/products/gpu-oriented-cluster/

Is really just going to bottle neck? (assuming 4 16x pcie cards.)

I really want to build a compact sim/render farm taking advantage of the cuda cores using red shift or octane (probably Octane since v4.0 is out and looks to be significant imporvements).

 

@Taf the Ghost : Sorry, i'm not familiar with the acronym IMC. I don't know if you consider this strange (not mine, just an example): 

I was under the gun to get this up and running in less than a week. Which I did. I don't doubt the build may lack some synergy, but this is what I got, and now I have to maximize it for what I need. The 1900 leaves me a lot of room to grow as I sort out overclocking and other specs. When I'm ready I will upgrade the cpu and the 1900 will go into a another box and I'm hoping to cluster the computers at that time, but I'm not sure that's possible with different cpu specs. The Raid is my working drive for Photoshop, AfterEffects, Nuke, and various 3d packages, but mostly I just wanted to say I had an internal striped ssd raid cluster.

 

 

I almost forgot to thank LTT for the vids, they really helped me getting this build together.

 

 

 

[Jurrunio]

23 minutes ago, 3deyoung said:

@Jurrunio : So an external cluster like this: http://amfeltec.com/products/gpu-oriented-cluster/

Is really just going to bottle neck? (assuming 4 16x pcie cards.)

I really want to build a compact sim/render farm taking advantage of the cuda cores using red shift or octane (probably Octane since v4.0 is out and looks to be significant imporvements).

Eh, I think you need to find out whether your apps need PCIe bandwidth for the GPUs. This cluster works with mining rigs because they don't care about PCIe bandwidth, but maybe rendering and simulation does.

[3deyoung]

Thanks for pointing me in the right direction @Jurrunio according to this:
https://www.cgdirector.com/best-hardware-for-gpu-rendering-in-octane-redshift-vray/

 

Yes, these gpu renderers do use the pci-e lanes.

 

Also, for what it's worth, Octane, even the brand new v4.0, does not support motion blur with displacement. It seems like red shift does.