hoknamahn Posted February 25, 2009 Share Posted February 25, 2009 Hi guys, So Houdini for Cell finally available... Sounds good. Do you know is it for these beasts? http://www-03.ibm.com/systems/bladecenter/...qs21/index.html Anyone have tried it? What benefits are? Does it use the full power of SPUs? Only in DOPs / POPs or everywhere? SESIans? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kumpa Posted February 25, 2009 Share Posted February 25, 2009 I am wondering where are benefits here since everything that is related to "blades" or "cell" has exorbitant price tag, except ps3. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hoknamahn Posted February 25, 2009 Author Share Posted February 25, 2009 http://pro.sony.com/bbsccms/ext/ZEGO/ZEGO.shtml Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kumpa Posted February 26, 2009 Share Posted February 26, 2009 ok, that looks promising but what about the price ? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DaJuice Posted February 26, 2009 Share Posted February 26, 2009 I never thought much would come from the SESI+Cell dealy, but you're right, it's right there under the production builds. Those ZEGO racks basically look like PS3s with more RAM. I wonder if this version of Houdini would run on PS3. I know about the limitations of Linux on it, and IIRC Houdini won't even start without OpenGL, but maybe hrender....? Would be fun to goof with if it worked. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
digitallysane Posted February 26, 2009 Share Posted February 26, 2009 The only place where I found a price approximation is here: http://digitalcontentproducer.com/videoeds...ucts_sony_0901/ Under 10K... Should be truly, truly fast to justify such a price, at least as a render node. Dragos Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kumpa Posted February 26, 2009 Share Posted February 26, 2009 From my standpoint I think it is fair to say that for 10k$ it has to outdo two 2x quad core equipped render nodes that costs about the same to become everyone's choice. However, i am aware that those racks most probably have far better performance/watt ratio. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hoknamahn Posted February 26, 2009 Author Share Posted February 26, 2009 From my standpoint I think it is fair to say that for 10k$ it has to outdo two 2x quad core equipped render nodes that costs about the same to become everyone's choice. However, i am aware that those racks most probably have far better performance/watt ratio. Good point. But there is also _x86_-compatible platform which has to be energy efficient http://gizmodo.com/5091473/sgi-molecule-pa...-of-awesomeness Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JColdrick Posted February 26, 2009 Share Posted February 26, 2009 The VFX biz started talking about this in 2007...and it's hard to find relevant articles since. Anything's possible, I suppose, but I don't see companies racing to implement a brand new architecture that requires significant porting expertise on the part of their suppliers to really take advantage of it... We'll see, I guess, either it will explode and become a major force, or it will slowly disappear...apart from a build appearing on the sesi website, I haven't seen anything else... Cheers, J.C. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sibarrick Posted February 27, 2009 Share Posted February 27, 2009 It seems odd that they would release a build on the website and not even make an announcement about it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JColdrick Posted February 27, 2009 Share Posted February 27, 2009 Actually, I think that speaks volumes. Cheers, J.C. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
anamous Posted February 27, 2009 Share Posted February 27, 2009 Maybe it's intended for hobbyists who'd like to play around with it - those hobbyists who like to spend over 20k $ on their hobby I recall having slides of a talk by I think Andrew regarding the performance gains and whatnots of the Cell WRT raytracing and dynamics. Consensus was that for some operations, the SPUs were quite fast, but overall, the performance gains were nothing to write home about. I came to similar conclusions a few years ago when I was evaluating porting a commercial renderer to the platform. Maybe that will all change once IBM or sony start stacking the cell cores, but til then I think the marketing effect of this release is larger than its impact on production. cheers, Abdelkareem Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sibarrick Posted February 28, 2009 Share Posted February 28, 2009 It seems odd that they would release a build on the website and not even make an announcement about it. Well yes my point exactly.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
symek Posted February 28, 2009 Share Posted February 28, 2009 I would expect 3-5x performance boost for cell machines (per $). This is the only way I imagine to convince market to assimilate new technology. Otherwise things most probably will go like you said. PS Of course the history shown that any specialized technology has short and miserable life in that industry. The simpler the better. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.