-
Serious AE problems!
Hi,
I am working on a MAC PRO DESKTOP 2.8 GHz Quad core, 28 GB RAM, NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT (GFX Card) OS 10.5.8. I am running AE 9 (CS4) My problem is Every time I try to quit out of AE it (unexpectedly quits) The Major Problem I’m having is RENDERING, My Multiprocessing times are very slow ( for example, I rendered a logo on my machine, it took 2min 13 secs, I rendered the same logo on a 3.0 Dual Core machine with 8 GB ram, and a Radeon X1900 GFX card, and it took 1min and 29 secs,!!!!!! this is a BIG difference! WHY?
I have had my computer looked at by professionals, and everything came back fine. “NO PROBLEMS” I tried re-installing AE over top of old AE (did not uninstall) to see if it was AE problems……still runs the same. I have done multiple tests on Multiprocessing options/settings. (using every possible setting) WHY is the older machine rendering FASTER? when I clearly have a faster machine, faster GFX card, and A HELL of a lot more RAM!!!! Should I wipe my computer clean and re-install everything? should I buy the best GFX card? (what is the best GFX card for AE CS4 and for CS5 ???) Should I upgrade to CS5????please help.
Thanks.
-
12 Replies
-
first off, the gpu/graphics card will have no effect on render performance in ae (as of cs5), so don’t worry about that.
as far as settings for multiprocessing, memory and disk cache, it would help to know what you have currently…
but for starters, rebuild the ae pref file by holding command+option+shift while starting ae. the default settings will disable the disk cache, minimize opengl usage and disable multiprocessing.
i would try a test render with those default settings to see how that effects that logo comp that you have, and use that as a baseline. i would also open the activity monitor (applications>utilities) and look at the cpu usage for after effects to get an idea of how efficiently the cores are working.
then, i’d try enabling multiprocessing, leaving 2-4gb for the system/other apps and leaving enough cpus for other apps to give you around 2gb of ram per core for ae (as you adjust the cpus to leave, the background memory property will show you how much ram per cpu will be used by ae).
then try a test render and see how that compares. also, check the activity monitor to see if the cpu levels are fairly high.
Kevin Camp
Senior Designer
KCPQ, KMYQ & KRCW -
OK. I REBUILT AE pref. file, I am not using Open GL, I usually don’t. I did a test with MUTTIPROCESSING turned OFF ( 8GB allocated for other Apps) render time = 4min 5secs. ( I also checked the activity Monitor while rendering, It was up and all the way down …..sporatik, but all were never up at the same time. Then I did a test with MULTIPROCESSING turned ON, here were my settings (4GB ram for other apps, 2.09 GB min. allocation per CPU, 6 actual CPU’s that will be used, 2 CPU’s to leave for other apps, render time = 3min. 1sec. (activity monitor was up and down just like the other render, except for the end they were all the way to the top for the last portion of the render. Still does not come close to the render time of the slower MAC.
-
I have the memory allocations for 10, but I am not running 10………Should I upgrade?
-
try setting the minimum allocation per core to .5 gb… you don’t want ae to grab more ram than it needs, if it needs more than .5gb then it will allocate more, up to the max per core that you see in the brackets for the background memory usage.
also, do you have any extra pci cards, especially video i/o? i’ve seen very poor performance in ae with aja cards if the aja adobe effects are installed, and sometimes even having video monitoring to those types of cards enabled can effect performance.
Kevin Camp
Senior Designer
KCPQ, KMYQ & KRCW -
In another forum I was told that the Dual core 3.0 would render faster than a Quad Core 2.8……Is this correct?
-
I SET it to .5 GB and render time was 1min 54 secs. this is much faster, but is it the best? I have no extra PCI cards.
-
I did get the update, but I just re-installed yesterday and haven’t had the chance to update again.
-
3.0 is a faster processor core, so on simple comps I would imagine it will render faster. We have a few quad 2.66GHz macs and also a 3Ghz quad and the 3.0 is quite a bit faster for most stuff. Best to test render on only one core to test that. Also, with multiproc switched on it does take a little while to fire them all up (at least with CS4 and below it does) so the more cores you have then will probably add a few secs at the start when you hit render. For more complex renders you will likely notice an improvement on the newer machine.
-
try leaving another cpu or two for other apps and see if you get better performance…
fyi, the most ram that cs4 can allocate to a background process (background memory per cpu) is around 3.5gb. i’m not saying that that is the number that will give you the best performance, just that you don’t need to shoot any higher than that.
you can also try tweaking the ram to leave for other apps… if you don’t have any other apps running, you can probably go lower than 4gb, but i would usually recommend not much lower than 2gb.
Kevin Camp
Senior Designer
KCPQ, KMYQ & KRCW -
[Paul Martella] “I did get the update, but I just re-installed yesterday and haven’t had the chance to update again.”
Installing that update is critical. It fixes quite a few bugs.
Walter Soyka
Principal & Designer at Keen Live
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
RenderBreak Blog – What I’m thinking when my workstation’s thinking
Creative Cow Forum Host: Live & Stage Events
Reply to this Discussion! Login or Sign Up