Terragen 2 - 90% CPU in Activity Monitor

[SilverCity]

Is it normal for T2 to continually use 90% CPU processes in Activity Monitor even after the preview has been rendered and the app is in the background?

My specs: Dual 2.0 GHz G5, OS X 10.4.11

[old_blaggard]

It's not normal for that to happen, although a few things might be to blame:
- You're using a really old version (1.8.64 I think it was) that has a bug that means it always takes up as much CPU as possible.
- The preview isn't actually done rendering - does it say "Finished rendering?" on the bar above the preview?

[SilverCity]

Thanks, old_blaggard. Yep, I had been using the old version. I downloaded it when T2 first came out, and it's been awhile since I've used it. New version works great.

My CPU's thank you as well.

[ZStar]

This has me curious.  I have noticed the same thing and I am supposedly running the latest Windows TG2 Deep version (build 1.9.04.1).  I have a dual core Intel with 2GB running Win XP. 

I ran some timing tests with peculiar results.  I tested with TG2 free to utilize both CPUs and with the CPU affinity set to only one core.  In the first case the Task Manager showed both cores being maxed and the second test showed only the assigned CPU being maxed with the other core nearly idle.  That is as I would expect.  What I did not expect was the the render time for both trials was the same.

It looks like SilverCity is running on a Mac.  It this "bug" only fixed in the Mac version?  Am I not running the latest and greatest?

Like I said, I'm curious.  I realize that TG2 is still very much a work in progress.

[old_blaggard]

The current public builds of TG2 only use one core right now (this will no longer be the case for licensed users in the coming days).  However, I don't know how you managed to get both cores going at 100% with it, but it's certain that you didn't get it *rendering* on more than one core.

[ZStar]

Thanks, old-baggard.  I think I had read something like that here recently. 

I guess I'm a little surprised that others have not seen this behavior.  If I forget to set the CPU affinity, something in TG2 sure sucks up any CPU idle time.  It is not rendering as my timing tests indicated and your comments confirmed.  I definitely notice a sluggishness if I have a render going in the background while I try to do something else.  With TG2 assigned to one core via the affinity, I do not notice any sluggish response.  I just ran another test and noticed that after completing the preview, the CPU usage drops to +/-50% on both cores (with  no affinity set).  That is still a lot of CPU activity for a program that should be idle.

Just my observations for what they are worth.  Hopefully the issue will go away with the new changes to the rendering engine.