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Martin_Winkler
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Speedgrade CS6: Where is the disk cache?

Jun 17, 2012 6:08 AM

Hello speedgrade users,

 

I hope I'm not being a pest with this basic question, but I'm struggling a bit with the status of the documentation right now.. I have zero experience with Speedgrade, I do however know my way around several other finishing systems.

 

I'm looking for the persistent disk cache. I have been able to find the normal RAM cache under the settings, but nothing else. I'm talking about the thing that would cache my digital intermediate as it grows (with layers and grades and masks and custom effects on and prerendered for review), but so far I could only get RAM caching to work with DPX playback, I am simply unable to find the option to tick on the disk cache and specify the raid where it should go.

 

Can anybody nudge me a bit in the right direction?

897 Views   7 Replies   Latest reply: Martin_Winkler, Jun 20, 2012 3:34 AM
 
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  • Manuel LP
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    1. Manuel LP,
    Jun 17, 2012 2:04 PM   in reply to Martin_Winkler
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    Disk cache?  If I am not wrong, there isn't disk cache, in SG is all real time in GPU.

     
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  • Martin_Winkler
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    2. Martin_Winkler,
    Jun 18, 2012 2:43 AM   in reply to Manuel LP
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    There should be one, and apparently there was, in old Iridas times (at least on the "DI" and up editions). Doing it realtime with the GPU is fun and games on a DPX-Layer with primary and secondary grade, but 10 layers of stereo raw ontop of each other with 10 effects each will bring every box down, no matter how new, it must be cached.

     
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  • Milan Hamos
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    3. Milan Hamos,
    Jun 18, 2012 3:38 AM   in reply to Martin_Winkler
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    I can confirm, there's no background rendering, all is done on the GPU in realtime.

     
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  • Martin_Winkler
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    4. Martin_Winkler,
    Jun 18, 2012 3:46 AM   in reply to Milan Hamos
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    Hi Milan, thanks for confirming Manuel LP's reply.

     

    We have an Intel 3960X with a Quadro 4000. I am struggling to get things to run smoothly (that's why I was looking for the prerender/cache in the first place). 2 stereo layers of red-raw and a few effects make my fps drop to like 5.

    Is that expected? How much is this realtime GPU solution known to handle? I checked if this was a simple i/o-problem on my end, but it wasn't - the raid has plenty of bandwidth left when the framerate breaks in.

     
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  • Milan Hamos
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    5. Milan Hamos,
    Jun 19, 2012 7:39 AM   in reply to Martin_Winkler
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    Yes, it seems to be a really heavy footage for your hardware. You can try to set Dynamic Quality (Settings -> Dynamic Quality) to lower resolution for playback.

     
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  • Dennis Weinmann
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    6. Dennis Weinmann,
    Jun 20, 2012 2:18 AM   in reply to Martin_Winkler
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    Hey Martin,

     

    As Milan already suggested, Dynamic Quality can help to improve playback speeds. With Dynamic Quality, you can achieve at least real time playback at 1/8 or 1/4 resolution out of one 5K Red clip. In order to achieve 1/2 resolution real time playback you propably need a dual CPU setup (Dual Nehalem or similar). You can also improve playback speed by increasing the simultaneously loaded frames (settings-cache):

    Screen Shot 2012-06-20 at 10.58.01 AM.png

     

    To preview a single clip on a low-spec workstation/laptop you can also play out of RAM (green bar in timeline indicates preloaded frames, gray bar shows max available RAM). You can use up to 80% of installed RAM

     

    Screen Shot 2012-06-20 at 11.17.25 AM.png

     

    To achieve realtime with Red stereo at half resolution you propably need Red Rocket hardware accelerator boards in addition. SpeedGrade supports the use of multiple Red Rockets. I'd recommend to use two Red Rockets for working with R3D Stereo 3D projects. Depending on the complexity of your grading (amount of primaries, secondaries, LUTs etc) you should also consider a higher graphics  with a bigger frame buffer (Quadro 5000/6000).

     

    Dennis

     
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  • Martin_Winkler
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    7. Martin_Winkler,
    Jun 20, 2012 3:34 AM   in reply to Dennis Weinmann
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    Hi Dennis,

     

    thanks for your detailed insight.

     

    The culprit in all of this was in fact the redraw. I split this whole thing into a 2 step process.. first got to the raws and DPX'ed them, I also conformed the resolution to 2K with a bit of headroom for pan/scan operations, since that is the target resolution. And now it works even with quite a few effects stacked on top of each other. I guess with stereo, multilayer and redraw those red rockets are essential for a realtime workflow.

     

    By the way, concerning Nehalems: the 3960X may sound low-tech, in fact it beats dual-nehalems up to X5687 single-handedly (and the bigger ones are still not too far ahead).

     
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