#Memories…
7 messages in this thread
At the risk of opening up a huge thread, I was hoping the experts
here on the forum would give me some advice vis a vis memory. I
recently got a new machine with 16meg and, as my old one had 32, I'm
feeling a little undersized. (I know, it sounds like a personal
problem).
With RAM the way it is I'd rather hold off buying the very expensive
16meg chips that this machine takes if I can help it for a while (who
knows, maybe memory prices will drop!) but OTOH I don't want to be
underpowered, particularly with release 3.
I don't do very detailed animations as a rule, but I'm just now
getting in to doing true color stuff laid to tape. Would 16meg make
most of you feel nervous or comfortable? I'm not talking about doing
the kinds of renders that take 20 minutes per frame (I average about
2-3 minutes per frame).
It's fairly difficult to predict your near-future RAM requirements,
but if your frames are typically in the 2-3 minute range, then you
*may* be OK for a while with 16MB. I would bring up a bunch of
old/recent files, render a frame or two and check memory usage
(Info/Current Status). If your past work is consistantly well under
16MB and your future work will be in the same vein, then you may be
fine for a while. If you are coming very close or going over, be
prepared to to a bit a swapping to disk. Also, I can't imagine r3,
with it's *many* new features, not using a considerably more RAM, so
this is another consideration. Finally, keep in mind some of the
REAL memory hogs are large renderings, large shadow maps, flat
reflections, tons of geometry, and the like. The Performance and
Installation Guide's memory usage section can tell you exactly how
much memory needed for a particular file.
>Also, I can't imagine r3, with it's *many* new features, not using a
considerably >more RAM
Ah, yes, this is one of the things I was worried about. I was kind of hoping
G would drop in and comment on this — or someone familiar with R3.
Maybe I should just go ahead and bite the bullet anyway — anyone know
of anyone who wants 16meg of 1×9 60ns SIMMS cheap? Unfortunately, my
new Gateway won't eat these (is this what they mean by planned
obsolescene?)
It uses more RAM… I'm in the process of putting some memory usage figures
together this week.
– G
I'm Intrested in your 16M. How cheap is cheap? Email me if you like.
Mike – I empathize with the RAM problem. I got one of the early
Micronics motherboards that takes only 4MB or 16MB SIMMs. I have 28
MB now, but to upgrade at all I'll have to toss a 4MB and replace
with a 16MB. NOT cheap! Especially right now… FWIW
David Taffet
The way to check is to hit '?' after a render and see the amount of
memory and swap space you are using. If you keep it below 16 megs,
you'rs OK. Over that, get more memory.
It all depends on textures, shadows, automatic reflections, and of
course the complication of your geometry.
If your scenes render within 2-3 mins, you'll probably be OK for a
while!
Greg Pyros