Anyone got a sandybridge yet?

Started by reck, January 07, 2011, 08:36:18 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

reck

If so please tell us what you got and how well it handles Terragen.

I'm thinking about upgrading my c2d to one of these.

reck

I've noticed they do two versions, one with hyperthreading and one without. Is it worth paying extra money for hyperthreading do you think? What difference would it make to terragen?

Zairyn Arsyn

right now they don't see to be available in the US yet. :\
i looked on newegg.com and some other sites & they dont have any S.B. cpu's or socket 1155 boards out yet.

wont be long though  ;)
WARNING! WIZARDS! DO NOT PREDICT THE BEHAVIOR OF OTTERS UNLESS YOU OBEY BIG HAPPY TOES.

i7 2600k 3.4GHZ|G.skill 16GB 1600MHZ|Asus P8P67 EVO|Evga 770GTX 4GB|SB X-FI|Antec 750W
http://zlain81.deviantart.com/

Tangled-Universe

Socket 1155 boards are available already. Just search for P69 or H69.

SB CPU's are available from next monday, at least, here in The Netherlands. Hardly can imagine they wouldn't be available in the US then.
Prices here are around 330 euros. But for now only 2 shops are offering them.
I'd definitely go for the 2600K model. It's just a few bucks more than a regular 2600, but it has un unlocked multiplier so you can overclock easily.
It is said that you can overclock to 4.5GHz on stock air-cooling.

Later this year 6 and 8 core SB's will be released, both with hyperthreading. According to Intel they are supposed for "enthusiasts" so it's likely they will cost >$600 each.

Hyperthreading works pretty well for TG. I know Frank has an i7 920 and I believe he told me once it is at least 1.5x faster than without hyper-threading.
On a $1000 machine (for example) I think an extra $100 investment for a hyperthreaded CPU is worth it.

I'm a bit undecided what to do. I have a Q6600 now which still does the job, but with an SB hyperthreaded CPU I could have a 2.5-3x faster machine, or wait for the six-core and have an even faster machine, but also an even more empty bank-account.

reck

I think general availability is from Monday but you can order now from some sites. In the uk for instance overcockers have over a 1000 in stock (or did have when they first started selling them).

i5
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/productlist.php?groupid=701&catid=6&subid=1275
Prices start from £139.99

i7
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/productlist.php?groupid=701&catid=6&subid=1859
Prices start  from £241.99







Henry Blewer

#5
A little off topic... Matt's rework on the render engine has sped up my old system enough for me to save for a very nice machine. I am thinking of getting two. An AMD x6 for entertainment, and setting up renders. Then an i7 for stills and animation.

Found this on CNET http://cnettv.cnet.com/2nd-gen-intel-core-chip/9742-1_53-50098484.html?tag=api
http://flickr.com/photos/njeneb/
Forget Tuesday; It's just Monday spelled with a T

reck

Quote from: Tangled-Universe on January 08, 2011, 05:37:38 AM
Later this year 6 and 8 core SB's will be released, both with hyperthreading.

Wow can you imagine running 8 cores \ 16 threads with hyperthreading with Terragen.

Thinking about it though terragen isn't very efficient with core\thread usage is it? I thought once you get above 4 (or was it 8) you started to see very little benefit. Has the engine been optimised to handle these new cpus that are on the horizon? Is running with 16 threads going to be feasible?

Martin i'm not seeing these "k" models on the overclockers site I posted earlier. Are these due to come out at the same time?

Tangled-Universe

Quote from: reck on January 08, 2011, 11:33:23 AM
Quote from: Tangled-Universe on January 08, 2011, 05:37:38 AM
Later this year 6 and 8 core SB's will be released, both with hyperthreading.

Wow can you imagine running 8 cores \ 16 threads with hyperthreading with Terragen.

Thinking about it though terragen isn't very efficient with core\thread usage is it? I thought once you get above 4 (or was it 8) you started to see very little benefit. Has the engine been optimised to handle these new cpus that are on the horizon? Is running with 16 threads going to be feasible?

Martin i'm not seeing these "k" models on the overclockers site I posted earlier. Are these due to come out at the same time?

Yep, i7-2600 and i7-2600K will be released at the same time. At least, here in the Netherlands.

I know that the threads scale less well on the mac edition of TG2, but I don't know how well it scales in general.
I believe 8 threads work fine, but more than 8 threads started to become less efficient.

Oshyan or one of the others should verify this though.
I will have to find this out myself too some time, since it's important to me too.

PabloMack

Quote from: reck on January 08, 2011, 11:33:23 AM
Thinking about it though terragen isn't very efficient with core\thread usage is it? I thought once you get above 4 (or was it 8) you started to see very little benefit. Has the engine been optimised to handle these new cpus that are on the horizon? Is running with 16 threads going to be feasible?

I have successfully run multiple instances of TG2 working on the same sequence to maximize core usage. Assign one core per TG2 instance and assign each instance its own series of frames. For example, with 8 instances and cores, use a Step of 8 and stagger them on beginning frames 1,2,3..6,7,8. All cores stay busy all of the time but managing them is more work. Also, you should have a 64-bit OS with plenty of RAM.

Tangled-Universe

That has nothing to do with scalability of threads in TG2 I'm afraid. All instances, no matter how many, are still running one thread.

But, if you experience scaling problems then it is indeed worth splitting the work over instances and cores to keep things fast.

reck

Hi PabloMack,

Yes I realise you can run multiple copies of TG, but that doesn't really answer my question. How efficient is Terragen when using 8-16 threads?

Taking another look at the different Sandy Bridge chips it seems if you want to overclock and have hyperthreading you only have a choice of one, which is the top of the range Core i7-2600K 3.40GHz :( It's a shame AMD can't offer more competition to Intel towards the top of the range. It allows Intel to be able to turn off things like hyperthreading on cheaper models and make "k" versions at a premium.

Oshyan

TG2 does very well at 8 threads. Performance benefits from adding threads/cores after that start to diminish and, depending on whether you're on Mac or Windows, going above say 12 threads may get you worse performance than fewer threads. It also depends somewhat on the scene. We're always working on improving the renderer and as it becomes more common to have more CPU cores/threads, making the rendering process more scalable is certainly a priority. We've made incremental improvements in this over the past few releases, and I think that will at least continue. Dramatic future improvements towards a more linear thread-to-render-speed relationship with more than 12 cores is certainly a possibility.

- Oshyan

PabloMack

Quote from: reck on January 10, 2011, 05:28:43 AM
Yes I realise you can run multiple copies of TG, but that doesn't really answer my question. How efficient is Terragen when using 8-16 threads?

Do you mean "How efficient is a single instance of Terragen when using 8-16 threads"?

reck

Quote from: PabloMack on January 12, 2011, 09:08:01 PM
Quote from: reck on January 10, 2011, 05:28:43 AM
Yes I realise you can run multiple copies of TG, but that doesn't really answer my question. How efficient is Terragen when using 8-16 threads?

Do you mean "How efficient is a single instance of Terragen when using 8-16 threads"?

Yes. You could run any software multiple times to improve the speed, it's how well the software can handle the multiple threads itself i'm on about.

Oshyan

I just bought a Sandy Bridge laptop, quad core running at 2.0Ghz. I'll report back once I receive it (hopefully Thursday). :D

- Oshyan