Graphic card when rendering

[Mustang69]

Hi

I have a pretty good HPZ Workstation that works fantastic with Inventor!

But recently I started to render images of larger assemblies and now things are really slowing down.

The graphic gard is older than the PC so I figure it is time to change it anyway....An older Nvidia Quadro

First question is if a faster graphic cards really speeds up the rendering process?

Or is the PC itself?

Regarding graphic cards there is a huge selection of cards to choose from so in what $ level is good to choose from?

My bigger assemblies can consist of around 1000 parts so it is not huge files.

I would like to have one in the $300-$600 range......Is that possible?

I happen to have a newer GeForce GTX 1660 laying around that I was curious to test but these “game cards” are not I the list of recommendations.

Is there an issue to use these cards with Inventor?

Other users here what are your experiences?

[dgorsman]

When you say "rendering", do you mean graphics on screen or creating image files/sequences/movie files?

The latter do not involve the GPU - the renderer in most Autodesk design products is entirely CPU-based.  Only the visualization software such as 3DSMAX and Maya make use of GPU rendering, typically with third-party renderer (Arnold now has a GPU assist, which is a relatively new tool for them).  So a newer/ more expensive/"better" GPU won't help you with Inventor rendering.

What you want for faster rendering is large numbers of cores without sacrificing too much clock speed, especially if the computer is also being used for day-to-day work (the requirements are almost opposites of each other).

[leowarren34]

Hello @Mustang69,

In short Inventor isn't GPU Compute Accelerated in any way, shape or form so a Quadro will not help any more than a Geforce* - However you cannot write off buying a GPU altogether as Inventor needs the VRAM - the GTX 1660 you listed is perfectly fine since 6GB VRAM would be fine as you're only at 1000 parts, if you were to go to say 100k parts then you need at least 8GB, I'll link the sources below. Rendering is all done on the CPU in Inventor so you may want to look at your CPU.

In terms of compatibility, both Quadro and Geforce cards are compatible but only Quadros can be certified - Nvidia's rule, not Autodesk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jT6YwF7NUSk In the benchmarking threads on this forum I've seen both Geforce and Quadro users alike with Geforce users preferring to save or have a spare one outback (you could buy 2 GeForce for less than 1 Quadro of the same spec) as if you have an IT tech a GPU switch of the same type is somewhat easy and the Quadro users preferring the guaranteed certification and the security WSHTF as you can't say you haven't got the right gear to whoever is above you.

If it's just yourself then go with a Geforce - the 1660 will be fine and the extra cash could be used on a better CPU/hardware, etc. 

The main difference you will see with a Quadro is a higher cost and potentially more VRAM, but the TU102 chip that actually does the computing will perform the same since it's the same chip in the RTX 2080 and Quadro RTX 4000. Quadros also have official certification and are certified by NVidia to more stringent tolerances, however, that's not to say that Geforce are bad.

If you want the complete workstation guide then TFI has this class and it can be taken as gospel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xvPX0BxljW4&t=691s 

[Mustang69]

I switched to the Geforce 1660 and it seams to perform just fine with Inventor.
I notice better performance mostly when handling the assemblies when rotating them in regular view mode without any special "Visual styles"........

When rendering image in the Inventor "Ray Tracing" this image takes about 440sec to get it to "fine" so the GPU did not shorten the time at all
We are taking about images that are not suppose to be realistic!   Just clear and informative

I also tried rendering with the "Studio" but seams really slow and hard to work with
Again I am new at this so I trying functions randomly! 🙂
This is 15min in Studio

So to get performance with rendering a new computer with really good processor is the way to go then.

[leowarren34 · Accepted solution]

Inventor studio is also all done on the CPU, there are GPU options that are more suited to rendering - VRED is the best but also very expensive but Inventor studio does the trick just fine.

I'm happy to advise on CPUs but that can mean an entire platform change.

Being a student I've played around with both Inventor Studio and VRED and studio does a good enough job especially as it's inside of Inventor and not another product.

[Mustang69]

Thanks we will keep this in mind when changing new hardware.

I don't think investing in VRED or similar is for us since this is to time consuming when it is not an everyday job.

Presenting images and movies are soon an normal job for engineering so really important functions in Inventor for the near future.

When I want really nice images/videos I now just sending over STEP files to media people doing this day in and day out.
Its quite cheap if there are just a few images

[dgorsman]

Assuming you're rendering to 1080p resolution, 15 minutes for that isn't too bad.  You can probably trim that down to 8 - 10 minutes by dialing back the lighting quality and some of the other settings from the defaults.  Maybe down to 5-6 minutes with the right hardware, such as a multiple-CPU workstation that throws 36+ cores at the job.

Render settings is really a dark art of maybes and coulds, without any concrete steps to get fast, good results.  It's a matter of iteratively adjusting one setting, observing the results, then either putting it back or changing it more, taking notes along the way.