Topic: What is the best configuration for Lumion ?

[tcristi2011]

Please help me with this issue....what is the best configuration for Lumion ... Intel i7 5960X 8Core 16 Threads with GTX 980 Ti 6Gb DDR5 or  Intel Xeon E5 2620 v3 6Core 12 Threads with Quadro K 4200 4Gb DDR5  ? The DDR4 memory is Corsair Dominator Platinum 32GB Kit 4x8GB DDR4 2400MHz CL14 and the mainboard is Asus X99-Deluxe Socket 2011-3.  I want to buy Lumion 5.3 and i dont know what is the total price for PC. Please help me. I want speed on rendering

[peterm]

Hi tcristi2011

Will you be using the PC mainly for other CAD work or will it be mainly for Lumion?  The i7 CPU's do better with applications like Lumion, the Xeon's have certain advantages for CAD based workstations.  We have plenty of users with i7's doing CAD, and also those with Xeon's working with Lumion.  Xeon performance configurations tend to cost more.

The Passmarks site has CPU statistics: and the Intel i7 5960X Passmark is 16020.  There are a few products for the Xeon E5-2620 depending on what Ghz you are looking at, their Passmarks range from 8006 to 10082.

Most of the processing for Lumion is done on the GPU (90%) so that's the critical piece of hardware.  The Quadro K 4200 has a Passmark of 4383.  The GTX 980 Ti Passmark is 10518.

So long as the CPU and RAM do not bottleneck(slow down) the data flow from GPU to system, then any good fast CPU (with RAM and motherboard such as the X99) is likely to cope with the demands of the GPU.

That demand does depend also on the nature, type and complexity of the scenes you think you will be doing.

Refer also further to:
1.  LUMION 5: Minimum hardware requirements. (same for prior versions).

2.  Lumion Web Site: Specifications.

So, you may also want to check what would be the cost with the i7 and a GTX Titan X which gives you further VRAM capacity for scenes (from 6GB to 12 GB).

If your choice is simply one or the other, then the configuration that best suits Lumion is the i7 with GTX 980Ti (or better Titan X).


Note: if scene and texturing requirements require more than 4GB of VRAM, you will need to run Lumion under Win 7 (Pro/64).  This is to currently overcome a known issue with Win8+ accessing VRAM memory of more than 4GB.

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DISCLAIMER: Please note that the above does not mean that I or Act-3D endorse specific products. We are unable to offer any guarantees regarding the expected performance in Lumion with the above-mentioned hardware, and you cannot hold us liable for any costs or damages incurred if you purchase hardware based on our posts on this forum or via email.

[tcristi2011]

I use Revit Architecture 2015 for CAD work (buildings, etc) and than i wanna use Lumion for render. In CAD (Revit) i design in a workflow 500m x 500m max. For this area do i need Titan X in Lumion ?

[tcristi2011]

And if for the moment i buy GTX 980 TI 6 GB DDR5 and in future if i need more i buy another GTX 980 TI 6GB is there any performance improvement in Lumion 5.3 or uses only one video card?

[peterm]

Hi tcristi2011

re your prior post: 

i design in a workflow 500m x 500m max

That would generally cover a single building design.

So in most cases it would be reasonable that a Titan X would not be required.  However, there are projects where very high quality modelling, texturing, and interior elements could push the limits of a GTX 980 Ti.  There are other steps in Lumion that can be done to help manage those sorts of cases though. 

... is there any performance improvement in Lumion 5.3 or uses only one video card?

Lumion does not support multiple cards in SLI or dual-chip configurations.  It has been looked at in the past by our developers, and has been suggested by some of our members/users.

[masrulpilami]

hi peterm,

i know this topic is more than 120 days not been posted, but i wish someone could help me...

Peterm, you said :

There are other steps in Lumion that can be done to help manage those sorts of cases though. 

how could we do that? or could you give a link to the explanation in the forum?

right now im having a similar problem, now im using GTX 980, i7 4770k, 32Gb ddr3 RAM (just upgraded from 16 because i couldnt reload a model), win 7 pro 64.
Problems are :
1. Framerate in build mode is too small, between 1 & 2 fps if I unhide all layers.
2. The render time is 398.37 s/frame in 2nd production quality. 1920x1080.

now the biggest problem is number 3. what should i do first :
a. Managing steps in Lumion (like you said before)
b. Upgrade the GTX 980 - (to Ti or Titan X?) cos GPU work 90% for lumion. my models so complex, i dunno which one to be chosen, the fastest 980 ti or the more memory Titan x.
c. Upgrade the processor to 5820K or else, which means i should change most of all components inside the cpu
d. Upgrade to ddr 4, which means i should change most of all components inside the cpu but i dont know if this could give me a huge boost when using lumion.
e. doing something that i do not know that u would suggest me

pls help me with this problems

[Morten]

Hi masrulpilami, which version of Lumion are you using?

[masrulpilami]

Hi morten,

Im using Lumion 6. I have more than 50 millions points and more than 3000 trees.

I was succeed in reducing render times by changing the spot light mode from speed (static) to memory (static) even its not really helping and the qualitys been reduced. I think the problem is GPU memory in the render time, rite? I should have 6gb memory in GPU like the reccomended hardware. But still im having low fps in build mode. #stilldesperate

Im curious about one think now, how could i render with accurate light?

Thx Morten

[peterm]

Hi masrulpilami

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