How does Aperture export? CPU or GPU or both?

[wheezy]

So, here I am exporting out 1800 images on my 8 core MP with ATI 2600HD. However, my system is sitting between 60%-80% idle on the CPU usage. So, my question is what does Aperture use to export? Is it just poorly optimized for multiple cores, or does the bulk of the work fall on my GPU? I'm guessing since Aperture is still using about 250% of my CPU power it must rely more on the CPU and if so... Apple - Get on Aperture 3 with GCD utilized! However, would I notice a slight-decent increase in export speed if I jumped on to a GT120? Anyone know?

PS - It is hoarding all my RAM though, at least in terms of 'inactive', I'm down to 50MB free of 10GB and it's dropping.

 

[Gav2k]

CPU unless your viewing them. Will it allow multipul instances like handbrake does? If so run the prog again and share the workload out

 

[wheezy]

CPU unless your viewing them. Will it allow multipul instances like handbrake does? If so run the prog again and share the workload out

Good idea, but that wouldn't work - only have 1 Library and I don't think I could share that between 2+ open instances.

 

[Ruahrc]

I don't know about aperture but in LR you can execute multiple batch jobs at once. It has been shown that starting up 2 or 3 batches at once makes better overall utilization of multiple cores than just setting up one batch. So if you export a lot of files in LR you can have LR export the first half in one batch then the second half in a second batch and it will finish faster than if you had done them all in a single batch.

 

[OreoCookie]

Aperture usually uses both CPUs. It uses a queue to execute jobs, so you can put many jobs in the queue and still work. They are usually completed in the order they come in, though.

A word to the OP: with OS X, the amount of free RAM says nothing about whether you have too little memory installed. Ideally, OS X wants to use all of your memory to cache things. What is important, though, is the number of page-outs, i. e. the data OS X has to put on the swap file located on your system drive. If you have a lot of page-outs, then you need more memory. If it is close to 0, you're fine.