3D Rendering on Apple Silicon, CPU&GPU

[Xiao_Xi]

Could we start a new thread to show the status of 3D programs in macOS with performance test results and update it only when macOS and Metal compatibility of those programs improves?

 

[StudioMacs]

Could we start a new thread to show the status of 3D programs in macOS with performance test results and update it only when macOS and Metal compatibility of those programs improves?

I’ve seen wiki posts on this forum where the first post can be edited with updates. Something like that might be useful so everything current is available at a glance.

 

[Xiao_Xi]

Pixar has released Hydra Storm for Metal

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1517581490795675648

OpenUSD/CHANGELOG.md at 3b097e3ba8fabf1777a1256e241ea15df83f3065 · PixarAnimationStudios/OpenUSD

Universal Scene Description. Contribute to PixarAnimationStudios/OpenUSD development by creating an account on GitHub.

github.com

 

[jujoje]

Pixar has released Hydra Storm for Metal

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1517581490795675648

OpenUSD/CHANGELOG.md at 3b097e3ba8fabf1777a1256e241ea15df83f3065 · PixarAnimationStudios/OpenUSD

Universal Scene Description. Contribute to PixarAnimationStudios/OpenUSD development by creating an account on GitHub.

github.com

Nice!

I wonder what preview is using for rendering USD; from what I understood it was using storm, and had assumed it was the metal version...

Hopefully this means USD on macOS will be more in sync (a working usdview would definitely be good).

 

[jujoje]

Just found out Radeon Pro Render has actually supported Apple Silicon for a while:

Introducing Radeon™ ProRender SDK 2.02.6

Introducing support for Apple M1, heterogeneous volume, and deepEXR. Plus improved CPU rendering, and toon contour rendering.

gpuopen.com

Someone should benchmark it

Could we start a new thread to show the status of 3D programs in macOS with performance test results and update it only when macOS and Metal compatibility of those programs improves?

I’ve seen wiki posts on this forum where the first post can be edited with updates. Something like that might be useful so everything current is available at a glance.

It would be great to have a wiki post with results and linking to where to get the relevant benchmarks to ensure she constancy.

 

[Xiao_Xi]

It would be great to have a wiki post with results and linking to where to get the relevant benchmarks to ensure she constancy.

What 3D programs and benchmarks should we publish information about in the wiki post?

 

[waltteriii]

What 3D programs and benchmarks should we publish information about in the wiki post?

All Blender & Apple Metal updates gets my vote.

 

[terminator-jq]

What 3D programs and benchmarks should we publish information about in the wiki post?

+1 for Blender. I have a 32 core/ 32gb M1 Max that I’m happy to run test on and create / provide test.

Blender is an interesting metric since we know there are people from Apple working on it. This gives us a good idea of how performance can increase with better optimizations.

 

[Kenjutsuz]

+1 for Blender. I have a 32 core/ 32gb M1 Max that I’m happy to run test on and create / provide test.

Blender is an interesting metric since we know there are people from Apple working on it. This gives us a good idea of how performance can increase with better optimizations.

Hopes Apple continues..dropped Projects in past.

 

[jujoje]

What 3D programs and benchmarks should we publish information about in the wiki post?

All Blender & Apple Metal updates gets my vote.

Benchmark Wise:

GPU rendering
- Blender's the obvious candidate as they have some standardised test scenes (BMW etc).
- Redshift also has a benchmark scene and should also be pretty comparable between Macs and Windows(particularly now you can change the bucket size).
- Redshift Moana benchmark would be good to track as it represents more of a production scene.
- I think Octane has a benchmark scene, but given their release schedule not sure how well it works or how representative it is these day.


CPU Rendering wise
- Cinebench isn't particularly representative at the moment.

A Metal / GL related benchmark would be good, but can't think of any off the top of my head.

In terms of Programmes (and status), the ones that spring to mind for me are:

- Substance Painter / Designer (Planned)
- Maya (???)
- Zbrush (Planned)
- Houdini (Beta)
- Blender (Beta-ish)

 

[BootLoxes]

Benchmark Wise:

GPU rendering
- Blender's the obvious candidate as they have some standardised test scenes (BMW etc).
- Redshift also has a benchmark scene and should also be pretty comparable between Macs and Windows(particularly now you can change the bucket size).
- Redshift Moana benchmark would be good to track as it represents more of a production scene.
- I think Octane has a benchmark scene, but given their release schedule not sure how well it works or how representative it is these day.


CPU Rendering wise
- Cinebench isn't particularly representative at the moment.

A Metal / GL related benchmark would be good, but can't think of any off the top of my head.

In terms of Programmes (and status), the ones that spring to mind for me are:

- Substance Painter / Designer (Planned)
- Maya (???)
- Zbrush (Planned)
- Houdini (Beta)
- Blender (Beta-ish)

I am in the beta testing group for Marmoset Toolbag 4 and when I asked a few days ago about an apple silicon version they said that there is nothing in the works at the moment since the rosetta version works fine. Freaking sucks

 

[l0stl0rd]

I am in the beta testing group for Marmoset Toolbag 4 and when I asked a few days ago about an apple silicon version they said that there is nothing in the works at the moment since the rosetta version works fine. Freaking sucks

That is just lazy.

 

[sirio76]

I still do not get it why people are so fixated on benchmarks, is much more useful to show what can be done on real production scenes. Personally I prefer to test software/hardware on my actual scenes that may differ a lot compared to synthetic benchmarks scenes. That's the only real way to tell if the combo hardware/software works for you, no matter how good it is a benchmark will offer only an extremely limited overview of what is a the real experience, there's so much more than render speed when it comes to productivity, editing speed, I/O speed, simulation speed and much, MUCH more.

 

[diamond.g]

I still do not get it why people are so fixated on benchmarks, is much more useful to show what can be done on real production scenes. Personally I prefer to test software/hardware on my actual scenes that may differ a lot compared to synthetic benchmarks scenes. That's the only real way to tell if the combo hardware/software works for you, no matter how good it is a benchmark will offer only an extremely limited overview of what is a the real experience, there's so much more than render speed when it comes to productivity, editing speed, I/O speed, simulation speed and much, MUCH more.

All benchmarks are is a standardized test suite that allows folks to compare systems. Your testing hardware/software on your actual work scenes is not that different than folks running synthetic ones.

 

[Xiao_Xi]

I still do not get it why people are so fixated on benchmarks, is much more useful to show what can be done on real production scenes.

A single number almost never describes a software well.

there's so much more than render speed when it comes to productivity, editing speed, I/O speed, simulation speed and much, MUCH more.

In addition to the benchmark results, we can add comments describing other important aspects of the software.

The wiki post should help a macOS user to choose a 3D software based on its performance and other important features.

 

[Boil]

The wiki post should help a macOS user to choose a 3D software based on its performance and other important features.

There's a wiki post...?

 

[waltteriii]

Just wait for the first round of optimizations 40% faster

Blender Archive - developer.blender.org

developer.blender.org

It seems this optimization is going to be included in blender version 3.3. First alpha coming soon and stable master in september: https://developer.blender.org/project/view/142/

 

[Xiao_Xi]

It seems this optimization is going to be included in blender version 3.3.

It seems that Apple has found an innovative way to improve Blender performance, and Blender developers and the four GPU manufacturers are working together to iron out some details.

Kernel specialization for scene settings and shaders: prompted by the contribution from Apple to specialize kernels to improve performance, there was a discussion of how this can work in Cycles in general. This brings up some usability questions, where users have to wait for shaders to compile or stopping renders or quitting Blender may be block since compilation can’t be interrupted.

• For Metal, to make this approach more practical there are a few things to look into:
  • Try categorizing shaders into e.g. 3 categories like low/medium/high spill and compile kernels for each, to avoid having to compile too often.
  • Identify which scene settings have the biggest impact and specialize just on those.
  • Investigate compiler improvements to reduce compilation time
  • Improve Metal API improvements to make shader compilation interruptible.

2022-4-26 Blender Rendering Meeting

Attendees Brecht Van Lommel (Blender) Thomas Dinges (Blender) Patrick Mours (NVIDIA) Christophe Hery (Facebook) Brian Savery (AMD) Stefan Werner (Intel) Sebastian Herholz (Intel) Michael Jones (Apple) Juan Gea Rodriguez Alex Fuller Notes Kernel specialization for scene settings and shaders...

devtalk.blender.org

There's a wiki post...?

It would be great if we could agree to make a wiki post to keep track of macOS enhancements to the most popular 3D software.

What 3D programs and benchmarks do you suggest we post information about?

 

[vinegarshots]

It seems that Apple has found an innovative way to improve Blender performance, and Blender developers and the four GPU manufacturers are working together to iron out some details.

https://devtalk.blender.org/t/2022-4-26-blender-rendering-meeting/24157[/URL

I'm confused... who are the "four GPU manufacturers?" And reading through those notes, my interpretation of what they're talking about doesn't seem to match your description of it

 

[Boil]

I'm confused... who are the "four GPU manufacturers?" And reading through those notes, my interpretation of what they're talking about doesn't seem to match your description of it

AMD, Apple, Intel, & Nvidia...

 

[jdb8167]

I'm confused... who are the "four GPU manufacturers?" And reading through those notes, my interpretation of what they're talking about doesn't seem to match your description of it

AMD, Nvidia, Intel, and Apple.

Edit: @Boil beat me by seconds but his list was alphabetized. ?

 

[vinegarshots]

AMD, Nvidia, Intel, and Apple.

I don't see where those 4 are "working together," though. In fact, I can guarantee you that Nvidia would never work together with Apple in any capacity. ?

 

[jdb8167]

I don't see where those 4 are "working together," though. In fact, I can guarantee you that Nvidia would never work together with Apple in any capacity. ?

Well they are discussing work to be done in Blender in a public meeting. Doesn't mean they are directly cooperating with each other on software tasks but I think having a civil discussion in public about an open source project meets the definition of working together.

 

[macacam]

I don't see where those 4 are "working together," though. In fact, I can guarantee you that Nvidia would never work together with Apple in any capacity. 😅

There’s more collaborative work done than their marketing departments would like you to believe due to concepts like brand differentiation. People like to give these companies personalities where they are at each other’s throats, but that’s never the case.

 

[Xiao_Xi]

my interpretation of what they're talking about doesn't seem to match your description of it

I may have misunderstood the meeting notes. What is your interpretation?