MP 7,1 GPU rendering on the new Mac Pro. News, updates, chat.

[vel0city]

Prorender was DOA and now officially put out of its misery.

Don't think you have any GPU renderer options avaialble. Best renderers for that machine would be Arnold or Corona.

The latest two releases of C4D won't run on that hardware IIRC.

Redshift M1 was officially announced this week.

 

[mikas]

I'd guess you have to mean that ProRender for C4D was/is DOA/dead?
It seems going forward for other softwares still, I have read. Like Blender and Rhinoceros.
Or is that just information overload of youtubes and social medias, I don't really know.

I did realize the Red SHift announcement though. It's for intel Macs too, and some not so recent GPUs too, that's what I have understood. Radeon VII is mentioned too in the list, as an eGPU solution. I am a little tempted to try that in a PCIe slot with an ancient Mac Pro, Open Core w Big Sur.

I'd really like to see Apple announce the A GPU really soon. SoC bound or not, either will do. I guess it's too soon to expect that at the 20th of April event though.

edit. Unsupported on older hardware? I don't know. Why would C4D not run on a Mac Pro with recent enough OS in it?

 

[lomahs]

Cinema 4D V22, V23, V24 crash at startup with Redshift-plugin installed on my MacPro 2019 (macOS 11.3 beta 20E5172i). Newer betas do not show up as available updates... Corona V7 daily build is ok with V22, 23, 24.

 

[hifimac]

I'd guess you have to mean that ProRender for C4D was/is DOA/dead?
It seems going forward for other softwares still, I have read. Like Blender and Rhinoceros.
Or is that just information overload of youtubes and social medias, I don't really know.

I did realize the Red SHift announcement though. It's for intel Macs too, and some not so recent GPUs too, that's what I have understood. Radeon VII is mentioned too in the list, as an eGPU solution. I am a little tempted to try that in a PCIe slot with an ancient Mac Pro, Open Core w Big Sur.

I'd really like to see Apple announce the A GPU really soon. SoC bound or not, either will do. I guess it's too soon to expect that at the 20th of April event though.

edit. Unsupported on older hardware? I don't know. Why would C4D not run on a Mac Pro with recent enough OS in it?

The 5,1 does not support AVX instructions. I believe R21 is the last C4D version that will run on it.

 

[hifimac]

Cinema 4D V22, V23, V24 crash at startup with Redshift-plugin installed on my MacPro 2019 (macOS 11.3 beta 20E5172i). Newer betas do not show up as available updates... Corona V7 daily build is ok with V22, 23, 24.

I haven't had problems with the latest Metal version of Redshift in S24. Corona v7 crashes on S24 on macOS 11.2.3, and Corona v6 Hotfix 1 crashes in R21, 23 and S24. Hoping the update to v6 to support S24 will fix the Big Sur bug. I'd like to stay on the stable release.

 

[mikas]

Lack of AVX will do it then for me, bummer.
Thanks for the info, no need to think about upgrading it.
I have tried to find that info for a couple of times today, but Maxon gives me only this:

 

[vel0city]

 

[gabrielefx]

Without decent gpus like GTX2080Tis or RTX3080/90s all gpu based renderers on MacOS are useless, all ATIs aren't designed for rt pathtracing on Metal. It's better running Windows 10 and using Nvidia cards like I do 24/7.
If Apple doesn't release professional products soon all 3d artist will move on Windows forever.

 

[edgerider]

Without decent gpus like GTX2080Tis or RTX3080/90s all gpu based renderers on MacOS are useless, all ATIs aren't designed for rt pathtracing on Metal. It's better running Windows 10 and using Nvidia cards like I do 24/7.
If Apple doesn't release professional products soon all 3d artist will move on Windows forever.

a pro vega2 duo is the exact same thing as a mi60.... or a quadro rtx 100... sure not the fastest thing, but it is totally descent compare to a 2080ti

 

[blackadde]

To put some numbers to that claim:

RTX 2080ti
$1000 USD MSRP
348 OctaneBench 2020.1

Radeon Pro Vega II Duo
$5600 USD MSRP
446 OctaneBench 2020.1

28% perf. uplift for 560% the price (broken PC GPU market notwithstanding)

 

[Onelifenofear]

To put some numbers to that claim:

RTX 2080ti
$1000 USD MSRP
348 OctaneBench 2020.1

Radeon Pro Vega II Duo
$5600 USD MSRP
446 OctaneBench 2020.1

28% perf. uplift for 560% the price (broken PC GPU market notwithstanding)

Sigh... But what most Render people completely ignore is that the Vega Pro 2 is a workstation class card. The difference is that Games cards are great at texture fills and a lower Poly count. In 3d viewports Workstation cards handle way more polys but are less good at Textire fills - Hence their poorer performance in Games. But when using pro 3d Apps like Maya/C4D/CAD apps They kick arse when you have to put together scenes with billions of Polys - which I had to do Recently in a C4D project. I have a 2080ti on a PC and it was sluggish to say the least... but running on C4D23 in Metal I could fly round the city in realtime.

You need to compare the vega to a Nvidia RTX 8000 which is still less OBs than the 3090 but cost $£5000

The 64Gb of HMB2 RAM helps too!

But I do get the point of Pure rendering Times... but it‘s all moot anyway, as most professionals have to send animations off to a render farm anyway. Why tie your machine up for a week when a farm can spit out 1000s of frames in an hour.

 

[Onelifenofear]

Without decent gpus like GTX2080Tis or RTX3080/90s all gpu based renderers on MacOS are useless, all ATIs aren't designed for rt pathtracing on Metal. It's better running Windows 10 and using Nvidia cards like I do 24/7.
If Apple doesn't release professional products soon all 3d artist will move on Windows forever.

What a pointless generic thing to say. I am a professional and I have run A Mac Pro with Vega Pro Duo for the past year and made a lot of cash and produced 4 TV 3D Title animations, a music video, various Corporate jobs and some effects for TV shows, As well as my own game projects.

It’s not the size of your weapon, it’s how you wield it.

 

[hifimac]

Redshift is available for M1 Macs. My quick test with my M1 MacBook with a heavy scene- the fan kicked on while it was compiling the model, but then was silent and did not produce much heat. My iMac Pro sounds like a jet engine when running Redshift. The responsiveness left a little to be desired, camera adjustments were a little jumpy, but it is exciting to see the development and think about what a non-thermal/energy constrained Mac might bring.

 

[vel0city]

Thanks for sharing, @hifimac Is yours the 8 or 16gb model? Air or Pro? How would you rate Redshift renderview performance for a modestly complex scene - possible to work on stills? Does C4D feel responsive?

 

[hifimac]

I have the 16GB MacBook Pro 8core GPU. I just installed and loaded up a scene I had. Hard to judge on a 13" screen. Let me hook up a bigger monitor and I can get more details.

 

[vel0city]

Brilliant, any impressions will be very well received!

Very interested to hear if the current M1s are a workable option Redshift and C4D until beefier configs are available.

 

[hifimac]

I'm done. I've been a Mac zealot for almost 30 years, and I've converted countless people to the platform over the years.

I've spent 4 years waiting... on 2080ti drivers to fill an empty eGPU... waiting on the New Mac Pro specs... waiting on Metal rendering support... waiting on OS updates to bring stability... waiting on next gen GPU's... waiting on Apple Silicone....

Meanwhile most everyone else has moved on. I'm tired making creative decisions based on the limitations of my setup.

The Mac Pro is just way too overpriced for what it is, and the recent GPU releases are only another slap in the face. $6000 for a $1000k 6900xt GPU is just too damn much. I don't care how much R&D + expense goes into passive air-cooling, thunderbolt pass through, "workstation class" whatever, and some extra RAM. For less than the cost of 2x 6900xt's, I can build an entire dual 3090 workstation that is 2x as fast in both CPU and GPU tasks.

As an independent I can't justify purchasing a current Mac Pro at those prices, let alone a dead end machine that will sooner than it should be EOL'd. I'm guessing this is the last GPU refresh for this machine. I know you can run future PC GPU's in it, but good luck getting drivers for that. This is the last round of drinks as Apple is showing AMD the door.

And the new M1X-whatever Mac Pro... I have little faith Apple will significantly pass the Apple Silicone cost reductions over Xeons onto the consumer, it will probably have non-upgradable GPU's that will age fast, I think it is going to take some time before Apple's in-house GPU offerings are competitive with discrete Nvidia GPU's, and the target for the "Mini Mac Pro" is end of 2022 (if chip shortages don't set it back). That's just too long for me to hold out.

So this is it. After 4 years of stressing, reading forums, and going back and forth in my mind... I'm going to place an order with Puget Systems to build me a Threadripper 32 core Dual 3090 workstation. In the short term I will keep my iMac Pro next door and use Parsec/Logitech Flow + a KVM to switch to do 3D on the PC. Not sure if I will move my After Effects workflow to the PC, but with MFR coming to Ae later this year, I'm sure the Threadripper will run laps around the iMac. And Honestly Windows 11 doesn't look THAT bad.

Hopefully Apple will release something "Insanely Great" that will sip on power and go toe to toe with this noisy ass space heater that will be under my desk or hidden away in a ventilated closet, but until then I'll be rendering 18x faster than my current setup.

If anyone has advice/resources for making the move to PC more Mac-like and manageable, I'd appreciate if you send it my way.

Sorry for the rant. Just needed to type this out. Wish me luck!

 

[zzzachi]

@hifimac
i bought a TR 3970 long ago, the build was about 5k and is faster than a mac pro for 20-30k
i use it side by side with my mac, which over time changed to be only used for photoshopping, mails and smaller tasks i have nice tools for on the mac. the main task (here 3d and rendering) i do on the pc.
the files are still stored on the mac and i use them on the pc using sharing / over the network.
you can forget that apple will release a reasonable priced workstation in the next years,
so this is a good way to work. as i don't do all on the pc the system stays very clean
and i dont have to bother too much with pc oddities. for me that was easy and works well,
because my main apps are exactly the same on pc and on mac.

 

[Adult80HD]

I'm done. I've been a Mac zealot for almost 30 years, and I've converted countless people to the platform over the years.

I've spent 4 years waiting... on 2080ti drivers to fill an empty eGPU... waiting on the New Mac Pro specs... waiting on Metal rendering support... waiting on OS updates to bring stability... waiting on next gen GPU's... waiting on Apple Silicone....

Meanwhile most everyone else has moved on. I'm tired making creative decisions based on the limitations of my setup.

The Mac Pro is just way too overpriced for what it is, and the recent GPU releases are only another slap in the face. $6000 for a $1000k 6900xt GPU is just too damn much. I don't care how much R&D + expense goes into passive air-cooling, thunderbolt pass through, "workstation class" whatever, and some extra RAM. For less than the cost of 2x 6900xt's, I can build an entire dual 3090 workstation that is 2x as fast in both CPU and GPU tasks.

As an independent I can't justify purchasing a current Mac Pro at those prices, let alone a dead end machine that will sooner than it should be EOL'd. I'm guessing this is the last GPU refresh for this machine. I know you can run future PC GPU's in it, but good luck getting drivers for that. This is the last round of drinks as Apple is showing AMD the door.

And the new M1X-whatever Mac Pro... I have little faith Apple will significantly pass the Apple Silicone cost reductions over Xeons onto the consumer, it will probably have non-upgradable GPU's that will age fast, I think it is going to take some time before Apple's in-house GPU offerings are competitive with desecrate Nvidia GPU's, and the target for the "Mini Mac Pro" is end of 2022 (if chip shortages don't set it back). That's just too long for me to hold out.

So this is it. After 4 years of stressing, reading forums, and going back and forth in my mind... I'm going to place an order with Puget Systems to build me a Threadripper 32 core Dual 3090 workstation. In the short term I will keep my iMac Pro next door and use Parsec/Logitech Flow + a KVM to switch to dong 3D on the PC. Not sure if I will move my After Effects workflow to the PC, but with MFR coming to Ae later this year, I'm sure the Threadripper will run laps around the iMac. And Honestly Windows 11 doesn't look THAT bad.

Hopefully Apple will release something "Insanely Great" that will sip on power and go toe to toe with this noisy ass space heater that will be under my desk or hidden away in a ventilated closet, but until then I'll be rendering 18x faster than my current setup.

If anyone has advice/resources for making the move to PC more Mac-like and manageable, I'd appreciate if you send it my way.

Sorry for the rant. Just needed to type this out. Wish me luck!

I mean you're not wrong on a lot of things here....but one thing to point out is that the "regular" 6900XT you are comparing to has half the memory; double the memory in any graphics card is usually going to be nearly double the price. Add that to the fact that while the MSRP is $999 IF you can get one it's selling for double that, and the special form factor, and the built-in Thunderbolt AND the Infinity Fabric Link--all not available on a "regular" card and the price isn't really totally out of line.

That said, the software world for most 3D rendering on the Mac is pretty paltry, and that's the big issue.

BTW, when you price out a Puget system like that, it's not really going to be that much cheaper than the Mac Pro, and a lot less attractive and a LOT less quiet. I went there....in the end, I built a PC for myself for the 3D rendering I have to do. It was cheaper than a Puget box although not by a lot. I built a 64-core TR with dual RTX 6000 cards. In terms of overall speed, for many of the non-3D tasks I do it's really not noticeably faster than my 28-core MP--not a lot of software these days uses so many cores. For 3D rendering the RTX cards are stupid fast. Using Windows is...painful. I definitely would hate to have to go back to using it all of the time. The smooth integration with my iPhone, Apple Watch and iCloud accounts is just amazing, and saves so much time by letting the technology just get out of the way. So, the Mac Pro is used for almost all of my regular daily tasks and the render box is used for just that, raw render crunching.

Quite frankly, with the availability of cloud-based rendering on demand, it might be one of the last render boxes I build. We'll see.

 

[th0masp]

And Honestly Windows 11 doesn't look THAT bad.

....

If anyone has advice/resources for making the move to PC more Mac-like and manageable, I'd appreciate if you send it my way.

Just wanted to comment on that: Unless there's some Windows 11 feature you really have to have and that is not already available from 3rd parties (unlikely IMO) there'll be no need to be on latest & greatest to stay compatible.

It might be wiser to configure your new machine with Windows 10 which will probably be the reasonable option for a good few years - as in no longer receiving disruptive updates - and pretty much guaranteed to be fully compatible with all your applications. Might as well let others be the beta testers for 11.

 

[hifimac]

@Adult80HD - I hear you on the Puget premium. If I could realistically source 3090 Founders for anywhere near retail I'd just build my own box. I'm not excited to have this unventilated, bastardized Fractal Refine XL case with an extra fan dremiled into the side, but I also understand the 3090's are a different beast both power and heat wise from 2080ti's, so I'm glad I'll have someone to lean on if I have thermal problems. I realize cloud rendering is getting there fast, but I've had often had hiccups sending things to farms to render, I'm not sure if a service RNDR alleviates so of those pain points.

@th0masp - It will be a while before I upgrade to Win 11, I was just pointing out that MS is heading in the right direction as far as UI goes. I know there is still lots of older OS UI hidden away in control panels and other nooks, and File Explorer is still a hot mess, but at least it shows some progress toward refinement.

If I could spend the same amount of $$$ I'm about to spend on the Puget system on a Mac Pro that wasn't about to become a boat anchor and was at least 1/2x the speed I'd do it, but even that 1/2x Mac Pro is still 3-4k more.

My only other alternative is to buy a $1800 scalper price 6900xt for my eGPU, but looking at benches, that thing would be almost 1/3x the speed of a single 3090.

 

[th0masp]

Well I think Microsoft is hopeless when it comes to UI and always has been. Their highpoint for 'power users' might have been Windows 2000/XP, since then it's been rather terrible Window(s)-dressing.

But if that is a computer for work then the priority is to get the best machine possible to run your software and it certainly checks out for that. Bonus points for having an upgrade path and being able to modify the box any way you need as well as not having to show up at some 'genius' bar to get it fixed.

Just get something else for day to day computing tasks. A sidekick laptop or Mini running something not-Windows would be my choice. But then I don't like headaches.

 

[vinegarshots]

I still have no regrets selling my iMac Pro and replacing with a high-end PC. I use Blender for 3D, and the performance using the 3080GPU is incredible.

 

[rondocap]

I really like the Mac Pro, and I'm also a big custom PC guy. I have a 24 core threadripper with dual RTX 3090s, but I much prefer using my Mac Pro for video editing - and with pro res or raw, it's really just as fast as the PC I have in real world usage. In benchmarks, the PC will win of course.

This is for video editing - where you can use afterburner, pro res, etc on the Mac Pro. If I were doing 3D work or something else, then perhaps the PC is an entirely different performance level with available hardware then.

But at least for video work, I feel the Mac Pro is very capable and - this is very important - very enjoable to use, tinker with, and upgrade. (It's very flexible in terms of upgrading for a Mac, so that's enjoyable for the PC guy in me too!)

 

[hifimac]

@rondocap - I use Premiere for animation edits just for the Ae integration and some sound spotting plug-ins, but still prefer to use FCP for editorial work. The PC will be a 3D tool and I'll always have a Mac near by everything else.