[BBLISA] Recommended hardware for Linux/3D/rendering?

[Thomas A Fitzgerald]

> I have a client who is migrating from an SGI to Linux.   He does a LOT of
> 3D rendering from thousands of stacks of images.    I plan to propose at
> least two configurations - a desktop configuration from an integrator,
> such as Dell, and one using COTS parts.
> 
> What recommendations would you suggest for RAM, CPU, video card, and Linux
> distro?   He is also a heavy OS X user but has a need for a souped-up
> Linux box.   Budget is not an issue.
> 
> I will do my own research, too, and see where suggestions from this list,
> along with my own research, lead.

I think you're coming at it from the wrong direction.... it all depends
on what rendering software he plans to use.

If he has a commercial package in mind, what does the package like to
have?  Check the "recommended system" specs, and hunt for an online
forum to see what people like.  (All rendering packages I've seen have
such forums.)

If he has his own software, what does it want?  If it's threaded, get
2 CPUs, if it's not then don't bother.  If it uses straightforward
radiosity-based rendering then it wants a "moderate" amount of RAM
(1-2G or so unless the images are fantastically large), if it's a
global illumination system then it wants *gobs*.  Can it even take
advantage of a fancy graphics card, or is everything done in CPU?

Depending on his software, he may be better off with a roomful of
the cheapest machines you can find or build, than one supermachine.

If he hasn't decided what package to use yet, then it's too soon to
pick hardware.  And, sorry to say this, but 3D rendering is one
of the areas where Windows runs rings around anything else.  Most
commercial rendering packages are *only* available on Windows.
Some people here with Unix backgrounds have a simple Linux machine
for e-mail and real work, and a hot Windows box for rendering.  I bet
there's even more available for MacOS than there is for Linux.

FYI, the machine I built most recently for this kind of thing was
a dual-3Ghz Intel CPU Dell Precision, 2GB of RAM, 2 fast SATA drives
striped RAID0, a $400 graphics card whose model I forget (graphics
card models seem to turn over every two weeks), Windows, and
3D Studio Max 6.  The graphics card is useful only for on-screen
rendering, not for rendering for stored images (this is common).

Good luck.