Smoke Tezro VS. New Linux Box?

[Anonymous]

Hello,
We are talking about upgrading our Smoke Tezro 4P V12 SGI box to the latest Linux system, “2x dual-core Opteron processor workstation” and were wondering if anyone had any experience as far as overall speed & performance between the two platforms?? The Tezro has been a solid box, but i wanted to know if anyone knew about any pros/cons about the new Linux machines. We also were hoping to get more storage options. Of course another question is whether anyone knows when Autodesk plans to upgrade the current workstation, if that’s coming soon we may wait for that.
Thanks

[kakutarvn]

@stevemanig 23764 wrote:

Hello,
We are talking about upgrading our Smoke Tezro 4P V12 SGI box to the latest Linux system, “2x dual-core Opteron processor workstation” and were wondering if anyone had any experience as far as overall speed & performance between the two platforms?? The Tezro has been a solid box, but i wanted to know if anyone knew about any pros/cons about the new Linux machines. We also were hoping to get more storage options. Of course another question is whether anyone knows when Autodesk plans to upgrade the current workstation, if that’s coming soon we may wait for that.
Thanks

Well, I too am on Tezro, but the new Linux boxes do have lots to offer. Mainly, if you want to stay current with new software versions in the near future then you need to switch to Linux. SGI is almost dead for Autodesk. Also, the new Linux boxes have better QT file suppport. The video hardware will soon be maximized (pixel shaders and such) when they rework the code away from SGI OpenGL.

BKM

[cyril conforti]

Yeah, Linux all the way. Don’t even think about SGI, dead, dead ,dead.

[kakutarvn]

Ona related note… has anyone upgraded from SGI to Linux recently? What was the cost of just the hardware upgrade, assuming that you already have a current software license, say with subscription also? Just round figures so I can get an estimate.

BKM

[Alex Udalcov]

We’re considering purchase of a Smoke HD 2008 soon…just wondering though.. with all the new multiprocessor Quad-core Opteron workstations (See new 16-32 core Apexx systems from Boxx) about at the moment, are these new technologies something Autodesk work into their packages fairly sharpish, or do they need months orf testing?

I mean, their website still reads a 2 x dual-core machine for 2K work….seems quite feeble at present, what with even the MacPro coming in at 8 x 3GHz Xeons as standard.

Or are these more powerful machines not relevent to the Smoke software? I just get the feeling that I’d like the most upto date hardware at the time of purchase for a piece of kit as priecy as the Smoke.

Thanks for any advice/news.

[Romeo Reidl]

Smoke and flame make extensive use of the GPU for a lot of their work, so throwing extra cores at them unfortunately doesn’t help as much as you might like. The extra CPU horsepower will speed up sparks, the keyer, color correction etc, but won’t really speed up Action or the DVE very much. If I’m doing heavy compositing, I usually go GPU-bound before I go CPU-bound. I’ve watched 45-minute HD batch renders sit at around 55% CPU utilization on my HP machine. C’mon Nvidia! 😉

[Sinan]

@brianH 24216 wrote:

If I’m doing heavy compositing, I usually go GPU-bound before I go CPU-bound. I’ve watched 45-minute HD batch renders sit at around 55% CPU utilization on my HP machine. C’mon Nvidia! 😉

It might be because of the slower readback of gfx cards. Does anybody know if linux boxes use hardware accumulation buffer for antialiasing samples?

[Dan Carr]

Yes Linux cost less, it’s fast. But for those who have octane 2, tezro system is still a good upgrade. If discreet lets you purchase the hardware directly to sgi… At 20 000 $ the hardware upgrade on tezro, you have a back on track flame 8 or 9…Not too bad.

[filip]

@BKM 23773 wrote:

Ona related note… has anyone upgraded from SGI to Linux recently? What was the cost of just the hardware upgrade, assuming that you already have a current software license, say with subscription also? Just round figures so I can get an estimate.

BKM

It’s around 50k changing all the hardware, CPU, Stones, monitors, etc…
We switch recently from Octane2 to Linux and the difference is huge.

[wwatkins12]

I would definitely not recommend purchasing Tezro at this point if you are currently on Octane2: although you can find a “bare” Tezro pretty cheap, and you could probably keep your DM5+VBOB from the Octane2, you will need to purchase a DM3 video card, and those are typically hard to find/not cheap. And if you are keeping up with Smoke releases, you will get only very limited life from the Tezro. So unless someone is practically giving you the machine, I would not recommend it.

As for the discussion of the Linux platform: I would suggest purchasing the hardware from Autodesk, or putting together as identical a configuration as possible. Autodesk puts a lot of effort into integrating the platform, and the “DKU” (Discreet Kernel Utility) distribution provides all the drivers, firmware and kernels you need to run Smoke. Also, the AJA video card is only sold to OEMs by AJA, so you probably won’t be able to buy that third party. Similarly, I believe the Eizo monitor sold by Autodesk has custom firmare to allow operation at 48Hz (dont’ know if that’s still valid).

[Dan Carr]

You can’t just run a smoke Linux even with the right hardware since V7. Discreet verifie the material when starting, and they also had a specific software inside Video I/o to verifie this card is provide by discreet…They don’t want people upgrade their hardware directly.

Money issue as usual.

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