Nieminen Mika wrote:
> 
>   Ok, I added a question about this to the vfaq. It can be found at:
> http://www.cs.tut.fi/~warp/povVFAQ.html#csgspeed


 Having answered this question on another newsgroup recently
it reminded me how often it is asked. I know that this pretty
much the same answer as given for the video card question but
also expands upon it to cover other areas. I didn't see it on
the VFAQ ( I might have missed it) so here is the response I
gave.

 How do I increase rendering speed:

 The truth is the computations needed for rendering images are both
 complex and time consuming. This is one of the few program types
 that will actualy put your processors FPU to maximum use.

   The things that will most improve speed, roughly in order of
   appearance, are:

 1. CPU speed

 2. FPU speed

 3. Buss speed and level one and two memory cache - More is better.
    The faster the buss sped the faster the processor can swap out
    computations into it's level 2 cache and then read them back in.
    Buss speed therefore can have a large impact on both FPU and
    CPU calculation times. The more cache memory you have available
    the faster the operation becomes because the CPU doesn't have
    to rely on the much slower system RAM to store information in.

 4. Memory amount, type, and speed. Faster and more is undoubtably
    better. Swapping out to the hard drive for increasing memory
    should be considered the last possible option for increasing
    system memory. The speed of the read/write to disk operation 
    is like walking compared to driving a car. Here again is were
    buss speed is a major player in the fast rendering game.

 5. Your OS and number of applications open. Closing open applications,
    including background items like system monitor, task scheduler,
    internet connections, windows volume control, and all other
    applications people have hiding in the background, can greatly
    reduce rendering time by stealing cpu cycles. Open task manager
    and see what you have open and then close everything but the
    absolute necessities. Other multi-tasking OS's have other methods
    of determining open application and should be used accordingly.

 6. And lastly your graphics card. This may seem unlikely to you
    but it's true. If you have a simple 16 bit graphics card your
    render times, compared to other systems with the same processor
    and memory but better CG cards, will be equal. No more no less.
    If you play a lot of games or watch a lot of mpeg movies on your
    system then by all means own a good CG card. If it's rendering
    and raytracing you want to do then invest in the best system
    speed and architecture your money can buy. The graphics cards
    with hardware acceleration are designed to support fast shading
    of simple polygons, prevalent in the gaming industry, and offer
    no support for the intense mathematical number crunching that
    goes on inside a rendering/raytracing program like Pov-Ray,
    Studio Max, and Lightwave. If your modeling program uses OpenGl
    shading methods then a CG card with support for OpenGL will help
    increase the speed of updating the shading window but when it
    comes time to render or raytrace the image it's support
    dissapears.

    Hope this help you to understand. Believe me this is a common
    question that has been answered many times. You want speed use
    a paint program :) 


  Any comments, additions, misconceptions, mistakes, or outright
  bogus statements  ?

-- 
Ken Tyler

tyl### [at] pacbellnet

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